Into the Woods

Through the heat of summer, I moved my studio from the garage into a spare bedroom, but that made it impractical to work in pastel.  As an option, I rediscovered acrylics that I had not touched in a long time.  

Working from a number of photographs of this particular path and tree, I developed this painting to recreate my impression expectation about the path into the woods.  I was particularly drawn to this specific view because of the broken light that fell on a large wild plum tree in bloom and on the sudden disappearance of the path over a low hill.  The drama was inescapable.  I have limited the details in order to focus on the two main element - the tree and the path, and I deliberately used larger brushes to reduce my tendency to add too many details.

This view represents my own experiences facing a path in life that leads only a few steps that I can see and then disappears into the unseen future.  The sudden blaze of the plum tree reassures me that the path has unknown promise if I am willing to walk this way.