2020
I originally painted this in 2007 and always liked the idea of a sunlit tree in fall yellow colors in this place within a dark cut in the mountains with the light driving down into the shadowy creek. I still like the yellow tree, but just recently thought I might have a better handle on getting the rest of the image done more effectively. Time does that in the painting process sometimes. You continue to grow and change and learn until that day you eye an older painting and it just hits you that it needs something more. I sometimes think that I could re-paint one painting over and over ad infinitum and be just as satisfied as a painter to keep creating. This painting was mostly untouched as far as the yellow tree goes, though everything else around it was altered. The composition and the intent was kept the same, but a richer environment was created to support the tree.