“Storms a brewin’.” Painted December 2022. 20”x30”. Acrylic on stretched Canvas.
A couple of months ago, I did a painting based on an overnight stay on Powell lake at a friend’s beautiful floating house across from Goat Island. There was something not sitting right about my previous painting of this range of mountains. The painting didn’t express either the sense of summer heat, the nearly ripple less lake, nor the delicious three dimensionality of the mountains in all their curvy glory. The fact that an afternoon summer storm was just starting to manifest was simply icing on the cake, so I decided to redo the painting using a very different approach. It amazes me how a painting can be reworked to the point where the original is almost unrecognizable. My motto is “No painting is left behind.”.
This painting is less stylized and more reflective of the moment I experienced, than the previous version. Normally I find the coastal mountains rather underwhelming, but this particular range is powerful, dynamic and much craggier than most. The sharp peak on the left is Beartooth, the one on the right is Rain Tooth. In my painting, a storm cloud is forming overtop of Rain Tooth mountain. This added more depth to the painting and also just a touch of drama to what was an otherwise hot and still summer day. Another less apparent feature of this painting is that there is a narrowing of the lake at the half-way point of Powell Lake. In this painting the narrows are just left of center between the gold/green mountain and the blue/green mountain. Knowing that there are still kilometers of Powell Lake to be explored around that corner added a real sense of mystery while I was applying layers of colour. It’s not apparent to anyone in this painting, but it was front and center in my mind while I was painting. As a fun side-note, I’ve included a recipe for a summer drink “Storms a Brewin’”, that would be perfect to sip on while sitting on the Karen’s floating deck looking out across the lake at Beartooth and Rain Tooth while a summer storm fomented.