Subjects are chosen not for their content but to explore color relationships. They provide the opportunity to assess questions of how much warmth can live in a shadow or how cool must a highlight be in a field of warm to be effective. The problem to solve is the idea and the subject is chosen to support it.

    Discovering the use of the palette knife as a painting tool has also broadened the variety of expressive marks. It allows areas of cool paint to be scraped back to reveal the warmth of the initial underpainting, or layered on to show density, movement or rhythm and brings more depth and vitality to my painting.

    Nearly ten years of plein-aire painting has developed my visual sensitivity. This discipline has strengthened an awareness of the deep reds and browns of the landscape enhanced by rainfall, the yellow-ochre of willow branches against the cool slate blue hillsides of winter, and the veil of fog that rises with the temperature over a snow covered field, softening and cooling the receding tree line.

    Each day brings a new challenge to paint, where I will learn only as much as I am willing to risk.