Branching out

Even as a child I was fascinated with tree branches.  Apart from being ready climbing frames, they gave me my first glimpses of various perspectives depending on which angle I was viewing from - looking up, looking down or just being level with the branch.  Even today I can't pass up a close inspection of trees or branches when  they are interpreted by different artists.

Jessica Hiemstra-van der Horst is a Canadian artist and writer  who is currently living in Melbourne, Australia.  I found her work by accident as you often do while searching some other topic on the internet.  I noticed she also showed at Cube Gallery in Ottawa where my work was in a show in the fall of 2009.  A coincidence !  I love the sparseness of her work, her breaking down the dimensionality of  branches into line and shadow.  It is the patterning of branches that appeals to me most as you can see in my Reading a Garden series on the Leyton Gallery website.

source 

Branches on Wall (2008) oil and marker on canvas 108 x 96 cm.

 

Sunlit Branches (2008) acrylic on canvas 40 x 32 in.

Sumac 3 (2008) acrylic, sumac, charcoal and oil pastel on plywood, 24 x 48 in.


Underbrush (2008) acrylic, raspberry & ink on canvas 18 x 60.5 in.