This is a new painting from the Facets show that opens Friday at the Principle Gallery. It’s called A Look to the Past and is a 12″ by 18″ image on paper.
There are a lot of things about this piece that I like, that keep my eyes coming back to it and making me think about what I’m seeing. For instance, the deep blue rise that cuts in a diagonal slash across the foreground with the peering red tree atop it. Its darkness plays well off the soft gold of the sky and its lazy clouds, giving it a sense of being a delineating point here, the transition between dark and light, the past and the present and other polarities in our nature. Much like the dividing line in the yin-yang symbol.
The red tree seems to be part of both sides here, rooted in the dark blue and basking in the golden light. It is in the present and in the past as well, which is represented by the softer palette of the greens and yellows of the landscape that moves deeper into the picture plane. There’s a really nice interplay between the sharpness of the foreground and the softening of the background that gives the piece an interesting visual tension.
It just seems to come together well and provides a launching pad for many different interpretations and emotions. I can read this piece in so many ways– hopeful, strong, sad, wistful, etc. It’s a kind of barometer piece for ones own psyche and has a complexity that belies its simple appearance, something that gratifies and excites me when I see it in my work. The ultimate aspiration for what I do…
Redtree Times 
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