14×18″ oil on canvas– Every day of the year is a sunny day… if you can only get above the clouds. I love days like this when just a few luminous spotlights find their way through the overcast… little patches of brilliant sunlight on an otherwise grey landscape. Just like with moods, you can appreciate the sunny even more when you also know the melancholy.
Tag: acrylic
Three Views of Third Lake
So, the lakes out of Big Pine don’t have the most creative names. (First Lake, Second Lake, Third… through Seventh.) This has nothing to do with their beauty, though. Don’t judge a lake by its title. My daughters took the liberty of renaming them all and swimming in most on a recent backpack adventure. I snuck away three times to paint Third Lake, our base camp. (all are 10×20″ acrylics) 
Hamilton Lake
10×20″ acrylic– So nice to watch the sun rise over the large snowmelt mirror of Hamilton Lake. I wished that I could freeze time as the light and shadows creeped far too quickly across the granite faces. Thanks to photographer Cameron Wolfe who I met backpacking up there for the pictures he took! 
Silliman Pass
10×20″ acrylic– This is the first pass you come to heading east from Sequoia. The meadows, creeks and rivers down the back side are well worth the trek. To the west, smog and haze from the many wildfires in California right now have settled in the central valley… the visibility is only a mile or two. On the flip side, it makes for some incredible sunsets.
Painting in Redwood Country
These paintings are around 10×20″ acrylic sketches I made on a road trip on the Northern California Coast. I love redwood forests… the way the light filters through the leaves and illuminates fluorescent moss, yellow banana slugs, fractal ferns and the soft red earth. It is so awesome how these old giants gather rain and make an environment where plants are growing on plants who are growing on other plants… long after they die their sweetly rotting wood is still pushing up gardens of huckleberries, ferns, mushrooms and mosses.
Sisquoc Loop Part 2
Alcove– 10×20″ acrylic
White Ledge– 10×20″ acrylic
These are a couple of 10×20″ backpacking paintings. I enjoy looking back at these– when you paint a spot, you are really present for an hour or two, completely absorbing the scene and letting it all in. For an artist, a painting is like a time machine that brings you vividly back to a place and time.
Backpacking the Sisquoc Part 1
Morning Glow at Cliff Camp– 10×20″ acrylic
Sisquoc River View– 10×20″ acrylic
On Memorial Day Weekend I went backpacking with some friends on the Sisquoc River loop. The river was flowing well and it was a fun adventure of creek crossing, rock scrambling and wading through fields of foxtails looking for the trail. I brought my ultralite painting kit and waited each day for a good view to sketch.
Rattlesnake Canyon Creekflow
22×28″ oil on canvas– I’m savoring the sound of raindrops on the roof right now and smiling knowing we have more boulder hopping and creek painting days ahead of us this spring!
Driftwood Beach Shack
48″x36″– Acrylic on Canvas– I love beach shack architecture… this one was beautifully made with driftwood, palm fronds and the timbers from the old wave-eaten sea wall. It is nicely decorated with a sandstone coffee table, a redwood log sofa that delivered itself on tides from Northern California and breathtaking views.. Shelter for any sea-loving soul who follows the trail down from the cliffs. Free, wild, natural, public real estate: the very best kind– location, location. location…
Fall Colors in Tucker’s Grove
16×20″ acrylic on canvas– Ahhh… the sweet smell of composting California Bay leaves and oak mulch. I loved the stained glass sycamore leaves and hope that the dry creek bed will be flowing again this winter.
Kevin Gleason Art 