Welcome Home, an oil painting of Birch and Aspen in the height of a spring display

Full image of Welcome Home, oil painting © Talya Johnson 2009

I am always amazed at all the colors that are present on a seemingly “white” surface. As I gazed out my window this spring, I let my eyes relax and lose a distinct focus. The colors that suddenly danced before me were dazzling. Nothing could stand in my way as I quickly sketched the welcome spring light embracing the new foliage and beautiful bark of these sentinels. Since the light was fading fast, I decided to write a description of the colors rather than to use the limited availability of pre-set colors of my pastels. I took some quick snapshots as well, and in the following weeks commenced the work of creating a painting that matched my vision. I tried to incorporate more soft edges than I normally do when painting trees, in order to bring added focus to the light itself. Many symbols appeared as the painting took life, and the resulting image gave me comfort and joy. Click on the above image or any of the following images for a larger view.

Close-up detail (left) of Welcome Home © Talya Johnson 2009

Close-up detail (center) from Welcome Home © Talya Johnson

Close-up detail (right) of Welcome Home © Talya Johnson 2009

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 4th, 2009 at 10:48 pm. It is filed under Paintings and Sketches and tagged with Alaska landscape painting, aspen trees, birch trees, original oil painting. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.