It’s wonderful to reminisce over an old painting, and to look at it with fresh perception. I see this violent, searching, brooding, stubbornly-hopeful tree as a chapter in my own history where I learned much. The deep lessons of darker paintings and brokenness manifest themselves later in the nuanced ways in which further visual exploration (and living itself) thrives. The simple curved horizon, and flat barrier between soil and subsoil are a compositional structure that has remained appealing to me. They are simple, and facilitate the enclosure of more detailed organic forms. I’m doing this digitally now, with There is a River and Fall; Rise in more patterned and intricate ways… but this tentacled beast may well have been the starting point. I don’t project onto it the same (angry) emotion that I did three years ago. Today, a set of hooks draped over the edge, it serves as a gracious backdrop for my coat-rack. Peace.
Tree – Large Size
