The One I Call Home

This is a piece I painted a looooong time ago that I actually like, perhaps love. Painted when I was 18 year's old, I was very much an amateur, though I don't think I knew it. I'm still an amateur. The things I keep learning, when I thought I had already learned so much, blow me away. This is as it is in painting as well as life.



So, this is called home, because I grew up looking at this little house placed at the bottom of the hill in my backyard. The little house is in fact a boat house and the bottom of the hill gave way to a lake, but this painting is my interpretation of so much that I feel about my childhood.

Yes, it is inspired by Van Gogh, one of my favorites. Beautiful yet tragic is how I'd describe my childhood in a very vague, visual way. Beautiful yet tragic is the connotation attached to this painting. Beautiful yet tragic is something I've put considerable effort into disassociating myself from. Hopefully I can just be beautiful, haha.

Some things are hard to describe with words, and this is where images can reflect concepts that are too full of emotion for anything else. This is this painting.



The Long Road

The largest painting I have in my possession at 30 in. by 24 in.,the long road, is perhaps the most drawn out thing I've ever done. I started it four years ago and got to a certain point and just stopped.

In my defense, I went back to school around the time I stopped painting. It only took four years to take it back up, but when I did; I really did.

From this point, it took me about six months to fully complete. I still could have worked faster, but the darn thing finally got done!

The majority of the work was still done in about a one month time span over this past summer. I had gone through a sad breakup, and the energy I put into this painting helped me a lot. I always want to remember that place. Not the sadness, but the transference of energy into something positive. It goes to show you, or it showed me, that anything can be turned into something better with the right mindset.

I've completed two other paintings, since I finished this in May. So, at least I'm slightly making up for my hiatus.