Blue Thrust, 1970s Oil on canvas 84 x 72 x 1 ½ inches Collection of the Art Museum of South Texas, Corpus Christi 2003.12.2

In the 1970s, Hood experienced her most fruitful period of both production and exhibitions.  With a larger studio, her paintings grew in scale and she created her most ambitious pieces.  Blue Thrust is a majestic and mysterious image that relates to several themes Hood delved into throughout her body of work. Hood preferred to keep her works ambiguous, but her descriptive titles help to contextualize her thinking providing subtle hints to the meaning. Here, aligning with her fascination with water and marine life, the painting calls to mind a whale as it propels itself through the deep ocean about to surface. It can also be interpreted through her interest in space travel. The smooth angular blue rocket-like form thrusts diagonally from the lower right of the canvas toward the top left corner amid a background that Hood texturally manipulated to create a cosmos filled with distant constellations.  Looking deeper, what first appears to possibly be a rocket, or a sea creature optically shifts into a portal viewed from below as Hood’s adept handling of paint and textures against smooth surfaces plays with the perception of space.