Standing Alone

This painting is too large to scan in its entirety. The first and last images below are digital photos and unfortunately they do not quite capture the richness of this beautiful piece. Please refer to the detailed scans below for a more accurate representation of the hues and textures of this painting.

This painting is very calming. Very peaceful. Any nature lover will appreciate the powerful quiet that can be found in a deep forest filled with cool greens and blues. The colors and textures in this painting are really rich and inviting. You will want to touch this one.

Standing Alone actually includes two separate ides that interest me. The first is that whole proverbial seeing-the-forest-for-the-trees thing. In many ways, I think that is the primary job of artists today. To help people see through the complexities and the messy jumble of input we are subjected to these days and to identify the individual trees. To clarify. In years past, artists were need to document a given time. But now days the media does all the documenting we need and then some. We no longer need art-as-documentation. We do need art as a source of clarity and inspiration, though.

The second idea that appears here is one that I learned about a few years back when Mike and I visited a National Forest. There was an exhibit there explaining how forests appear, mature and eventually die. It described how different kinds of trees grow around one another reaching for light and how the trees that were best at reaching the light eventually choked off the smaller weaker trees which withered from too little light and died. It was an eye-opener to learn that fierce competition occurred among trees! But it also convinced me that people are blessed in that we can move around to meet our needs. We do not have to compete. We can each find our own light. Or better yet, create our own light!

I am hopeful this unusual painting will work a bit of wilderness magic in your home.

How Standing Alone was created..... This piece is the result of many different processes. I used palette knives and brushes and dental tools and a soft cloth and a few wet paper towels to create the gorgeous muted forest behind the window and to create the sculptural window itself as well as the lovely lone tree. The different layers were applied and allowed to dry over the course of several days. Finally, I completed the piece using tiny detail brushes and adding the fine black lines and the words.

(The sides of the canvas are painted with a mottled mix of dark greens and dark blues. This is a digital photo. The scans above are more accurate.)

This piece was painted on a gallery-wrapped stretched canvas with deep 1.5" staple free sides. The sides have been painted in colors that accent the image and this piece looks beautiful displayed unframed.