Oil on canvas, 48 x 48 inches
Exhibited: Dominique Boisjoli Fine Art, Santa Fe, New Mexico
 
Thank you, Dominique and to the couple that purchased this oil for their collection.
 
About this oil:
When talking with other artists and students, I like to bring up the question of how can we make a green forest more interesting. Color is an obvious tool but composition, complexity, contrast, depth and atmosphere are some of the many other solutions and here they are the drivers of this oil.
 
At least that is what I started out to do last year. This painting is a variation of a smaller, vertical one I was very happy with, so I laid out this more ambitious, 4 foot square version. As it turned out, I literally got lost in the woods in this one and after a number of studio sessions and a lot of hours, I just put it away for a time.
 
Months later I brought it out and took a hard look at where the painting was and what would be needed to make it better. In this case, the most obvious solution was contrast - more darks and lights in the tree trunks. Once that was attended to, more depth in the painting emerged and the oil immediately came to life. 
 
This is where it is fun to be an artist that loves color, so that said, I pushed the color everywhere, while adding whatever made the painting more interesting and compelling, putting more hours in and pushing it to a better place. 
 
The painting will tell you when it is finished, and although I didn’t want to let it go because the process was so enjoyable, there was nothing left to add, so out into the world it goes.