January is usually a month of probing for me, a time of looking for a direction in which to move, work-wise. Sometimes it’s a struggle and sometimes it comes more easily. I’ve written recently about a feeling of being on a plateau with my work, one that has been my home for quite some time now and one from which I am beginning to feel anxious to move above. This plateau feeling has made this January searching more of a struggle than normal, as though I were a rock climber faced with a sheer cliff before me and can’t quite make out my next move. I am just standing there looking for an edge in the rock face to find a hold that will me to pull myself up.
Maybe it’s that analogy that brought about this new piece, Mountains to Climb, a 12″ by 12″ canvas. It features a swirling sky and a more prominent peak beyond the foothills that have been a fixture in my typical work, There’s an alluring quality to tall peaks that can’t be denied. It is both a question and a challenge that stands between you and the horizon: Do you have the will and the ability to climb higher?
It’s a question that still rings in my ears as I stand before my own personal mountain. I think I have my answer and I am beginning to see a way upward, a first hold to pull myself up.
We shall see…
Redtree Times 
However you answer the questions, the painting is deeply appealing. I have to smile – the single, red-roofed house suggests someone in the red-roofed village has had enough and made for the country – continuity in the midst of radical change.
Metal roofing is an attractive option out here where, when we do get rain, it is usually in the form of a thunderstorm with hail. One of the colors the roofing comes in is just about the shade of the red roofs on your white houses. I see contrasts in this picture. The yellow sky against the green of the mountains, the mountains rising up out of the flat land. The house as a man-made structure against nature’s structures. The path against the trackless country beyond. It looks like the path ends just past the house. As with many of your works, this one would make an excellent appliqué quilt or wall hanging.
ahaha, very simple yet striking piece of work. the texture makes it doubly captivating… 🙂