This is an oil painting of a view from a garden in Maui. I have always felt that the best inspiration for artists to produce the visual content they do comes from the natural beauty surrounding us. I am lucky that I get to travel a lot, and in my travels around the world, I get to visit a lot of the local botanical gardens.
Oil painting, in particular, is a medium that I feel best captures the brilliance of nature and, at the same time, creates a visual language of its own in the strokes of the paintbrush and the texture of the paint on the canvas. Nature, in and of itself, is the most incredible work of art. Nature reflects the change of seasons with the different colors of the flowers and the leaves, the blossoms, and the impact these plants have on the beauty of the landscape.
From the landscapes of Sicily to the mesmerizing National Orchid Garden in Singapore, my travels around the world have exposed me to a vast array of settings, which have genuinely brought awe and an innate appreciation of everything around me. This oil pastel depicts the beautiful setting of the Soller Botanical Gardens in Mallorca.
In my oil paintings, I try to capture nature in art through my own visual language. I think the works from the likes of masters like Van Gogh and the post-impressionists set the proverbial playing field for artists nowadays to be able to fully express their own interpretation of the brilliance of nature in captivating oil paintings for eons to come.
JAPANESE MAPLE TREE
While photography serves as an adequate medium to represent this beauty, I feel that oil painting allows me as an artist to take better command of how to represent the natural compositions to create harmonious images. It gives me a more hands-on approach and allows me to become involved with the process by building up the body of paint on the canvas to create more engaging visuals. Rather than a straightforward representation, oil painting allows me to capture nature in art in a way that photographs never could. The beautiful gardens I have visited worldwide inspired me to make what I feel is some of the most fulfilling work I have created in my career as an artist.
These plants were on my patio for years and inspired several paintings.
These oil paintings make for the perfect pieces for anybody to have in their home. The vibrant colors, the contrast between the different forms and shapes, the texture of the paint, and the intricacies of the brush strokes add a very pleasing aesthetic. As good as all the new media art is, nothing beats the captivating presence of old traditional oil paintings and the magnetic personality they add to any space.
Check out my article about San Francisco Botanical Garden photographs!
