Riverscape revisited:a Lift in the Fog

A Lift in the Fog  2012 C.L.Burgess

oil on canvas 8 x 16

There is something so wonderful being able to live near water in all seasons of the year.

I have many photo resources from my numerous walks along the James river. This  is looking towards the north 'west end' from the Huguenot Bridge as the sun rises over the fog on an early September morning. It was so very  peaceful. These days, the bridge is always noisy as it is being rebuilt.

I have been immersed in reading about George Inness' work later in his life as a painter and I am so in awe of the spirit of the land he was able to convey. His later works are abstract in the sense that place, in my humble opinion, is more psychological than real, causing 'vibrations in the soul' to coin some thought from 20th century artist Kandinsky in his treatise Concerning the Spiritual in Art. 

Inness was, in fact, absorbed and influenced by the writing of Emanuel_Swedenborg.

His tonal style of painting, and the absense of or mere suggestion of humans, lends the ethereal quality to his later landscapes.

I must confess that this painting is a redo. The original painting was in my first gallery show back in 2007. While the painting was ok for my intention at that time, it begged additional elements upon a recent self critique. And you know what happens when that happens, if you are a painter, correct?

I am satisfied today with this result and will continue to invoke the spirit of Mr.Inness for the time being. However, I won't totally abandon my palette knife, or a more gregarious use of color because I am having some fun with that and like the bravado it prods from my otherwise inclination to "fuss too much", but I will try to be patient with my search to convey accurately the emotion that moves me to lift the brush at all. Indirect or direct painting, that is always the question to lift out of the fog of information.