Painting the Landscape

Painting the landscape is a way of telling a story in a universal language.  I can stir a memory or prompt a daydream without the need for words.  Even without a title, or a description, people understand what they’re seeing without the need for a common spoken language.  No verbal or written explanation is necessary.  A viewer can see what I saw and draw on their own personal experience to make up their own story.

Old houses, barns, and sheds all remind us that the quiet drama of every day life once took place here.  A light once burned in those old dark windows… children were born in that house, and played in that yard.  Someone once labored to build that fence or old shed, for reasons that were important to their lives.  Animals were protected in that old barn, where someone once mended harnesses, and pitched hay from its loft.  Perhaps a wagon, and later an old truck, bounced down that dusty road to deliver goods, or carry a family to church.  Someone once sat on that porch and watched the sun go down after a day of labor… or strolled along the bank of that creek and dreamed dreams that may – or may not – have become reality.  Or maybe they simply stood at the edge of an open field or on a wooded path and listened to the sounds that nature makes.

A painting can tell us that man once passed this way.  It can also be a reminder that life and beauty exist without our intervention, and with all our dreams and aspirations, we only borrow the space for a time.