Kevin Fletcher uses the crumbling infrastructure of Mare Island, California as the inspiration for this monotype. Mare Island was a Naval Base and shipyard in Vallejo. The base was closed in 1993, displacing 5,800 employees.
After a long decontamination of toxic materials period the base is being revitalized and being used by the community and the public.
In an October 13, 2007 review of Fletcher's monotypes at a San Francisco exhibition, San Francisco Chronicle reviewer Kenneth Baker made the following observations:
"North Bay artist Kevin Fletcher has verged on the topical now and then in his masterly monotypes, evoking industrial architecture - and thus, industrialism - in ruins…. Contemporary graphic art does not get any better.
Fletcher can stand comparison with Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720-1778), whose etchings of imaginary prison interiors they sometimes bring to mind. Fletcher has added monochrome tints to several of the new prints, enhancing their suggestions of smoky light."