Image of the Week: Ashokan High Point, Spring
© Durga Yael Bernhard
There's nothing more hopeful than the unfolding new life of spring. I can't resist landscape painting en plein air at this time of year. Here's an acrylic I did in 2006, part way up Ashokan High Point Mountain in West Shokan, NY. Typical of my landscapes, a view through trees at something in the distance was what inspired me. The polarity of near against far and large against small never fails to intrigue me. Here, too, my obsession with diagonals was just beginning – and continues to this day. The opposite slant of those grasses is no accident. It must have been a cool and windy day, much like today. I remember leaping across a ditch to reach the edge of this roadside meadow. I had driven part way up the mountain, and sat on its sloping flank looking up at the jagged summit. I've hiked to the top several times, where wild blueberries thrive among flat slabs of exposed rock.
More polarity is set up in this painting by color. In the foreground, warmer tones speak of more advanced spring growth. In the distance, the cooler hues of winter still linger – so typical of early May in the Catskills. Warm and cool fields of color vibrate against each other, while the black trees with their blushing tips cut across like nature's calligraphy. More diagonals assert themselves in the conifers, suggesting movement. And atop it all, the broad, serene tilt of the mountain, where the trees are scaled down to tiny brushstrokes tinged with teal and magenta.
I think I was trying to convey the movement of the earth as much as the wind. If you sit in a high mountain meadow, you can feel the swell of this massive planet under your body. I sat there for a long time, crushing ferns with my cardboard portfolio, which served as a working surface.
Ashokan High Point is 29" wide by 21" high, acrylic on 140-pound watercolor paper – and it's for sale (as are most of the artworks shown in this blog). Please inquire if you're interested.
The subtle, changing colors of spring, the airy patterns of blossoming trees, the finely scaled textures of baby leaves, all whisper so many possibilities. I'm lucky to fit in one spring landscape painting each May. I just started a new one two days ago – a more distant view of this same mountain from across the lake that lies at its base. If I don't jump for it, I lose the chance for a whole year. The season of sweet, suggestive color passes quickly.
Wishing you a week of springtime cheer,
D Yael Bernhard