Crossing Paradise

Curator’s Comment:

Lush exuberance meets desert fauna in Crossing Paradise. The broken color throughout the work imparts fluidity into the verdant landscape.  I appreciate the strong use of atmospheric perspective as the yellow ochre in the foreground advances to meet the viewer while the softer cool hues recede on a distant horizon.  The brushstrokes (or palette knife?) offer chunky solidity of form to the supple shrubs.  Hot Delight is similarly constructed, but the square shape of the canvas pulls away from the traditional illusionary window.  Instead of arriving at a vast expanse, this equally opulent landscape pushes up and meets a paler blue sky.  I like your other pieces depicting more lavish blooms, but there’s richness in these two paintings that for me surpasses the more explicit beauty of fields of flowers and explosive color.  In the end, the nimble painting skill and cultivated control in the desert scenes promises the expectant viewer more, and delivers us to a place of restrained but intense beauty.