This landscape is the debut painting in my new series, "What's Your 20?" as I celebrate my 20th anniversary of working as a full-time professional artist. I grew up in southern Wisconsin during an era when the daytime high within the first two weeks of January often never crested zero degrees Fahrenheit. I fear no cold weather; in fact, I relish it. To me, there's something restorative about the stripped down, bare bones clarity of freezing temperatures complemented by a fresh layer of fluffy snow. Winter's peacefulness is a haven in our modern world. I now call east Tennessee home. After five years, I'm still not acclimated to our sizzling summers (and probably never will be). But we do get four distinct seasons. I caught this moment in the Great Smoky Mountains during January. I was totally elated to get my "winter fix" here in Tennessee. Click through the images here to watch a video from my hike that day and get a sense of the gorgeous surroundings. An initial study of this motif is also available.
