First Signs of Fall

original painting: 17x24, oil on panel

this painting is available for purchase, contact the artist for information

In the summer of 2021 I was awarded an opportunity to spend two weeks in the Bob Marshall Wilderness Complex in the northern Rockies to focus on my art and creative process as a participant in the Artist-Wilderness Connection program. 

Just as important as the sketches and paintings that I created during my residency was the undistracted time I spent at the Granite Cabin reading, writing, and thinking about the concepts of place and wilderness and how these ideas can be made into my artwork. This work evolved into an idea that the landscape around me had three stories to tell: a geological story, a natural story, and a cultural story. These stories were then incorporated into a new series of paintings to capture the full story of this place in the Great Bear Wilderness.

During my residency I got to see the forest make its slow transition from summer into fall. This was visually evident when the underbrush started turning shades of yellow, most notably the thimbleberry and rocky mountain maple.  "First Signs of Fall" shows the colors of the forest just upstream from the cabin.