Costa Rica 2007
July 18, 2007
Ordinarily I am not a huge fan of landscape paintings, but lately I have become more interested in this genre. Perhaps it is because I am in Costa Rica, and interesting landscapes are everywhere.
I painted this view of Volcán Poás a few days ago from a photograph I took. Painting from photographs is also something I try to avoid, but in this case it was unavoidable. Volcán Poás releases billowing sulfur clouds that are toxic, and it is not advisable to linger near the volcano crater for more than twenty minutes to avoid overexposure, so painting from life would not be possible.
This image was a lot of fun to paint. It was a change from the hard edged geometry that my paintings usually consist of, and was painted relatively quickly. The volcano was so foreign and something of a moonscape and I hope to have captured that uniqueness in this piece. I am thinking that perhaps I will paint a few more landscapes while I am in Costa Rica.
"Stirred together, volcanic rock and rising sulfur,
This other-worldly soup that feeds our hunger
For the feel of God’s pure breath." -Gwen Bindas