Oswego Creek Spring

From a walk last weekend. That little 1/3 mile stream has so much variety and beauty, I`m always surprised I hardly see anyone back there.


oil on canvas 30"x24"


Available Work

Late March

That`s the best I can do for a title right now. This is a daily painting of an unknown flowering tree on the bank of Oswego Creek. I`m starting a larger version with the water included.

oil on panel 6"x6"


Available Work

Wet Winter Forest 2 / Cascade Head

It`s time to leave the winter woods. All of the recent forest paintings were inspired by a walk on Minto Brown Island a month ago.
We took my friend from New York to Cascade Head to hike the Nature Conservancy trail. It is simply spectacular. The Sitka Center for Art and Ecology is very close by and the deadline for artists in residency applications is April 20.


oil on canvas 24"x20"


Available Work

Winter Apples

From 1995.
One of my first restaurant jobs was dish washing at the original Cafe Beaujolais in Mendocino California. After I finished late at night, I would drive back to the farm where I was living and walk through the garden to get to my cabin. By the path was a Golden Delicious apple tree. Lots of fruit would still be hanging well into the winter. They tasted the best then and glowed in the moonlight.


oil on canvas 42"x46"



Available Work

Plein Air Watercolor Landscape

I have an old friend visiting and haven`t been painting.
This is an on site watercolor painted at the Joy Creek Nursery in 1999.
watercolor on paper 14.25"x10.50"


Available Work

Night on the Lake

A Daily painting.
Nathan Fowkes chose a painting of mine to be included in the online science fiction magazine 'Tor'. An issue devoted to images of spring. There are some knock out artworks, take a look. The dusky forest painted by Thomas Millie Dow, a 19th century Scottish painter, just humbles me. Also included is John Twachtman`s "Arques-la-Bataille", maybe my favorite painting in existence. When I stumbled upon it in the Met on my first visit to New York I was speechless. Thank you Nathan for the honor!


watermedia on paper 5"x5"

Available Work

Into a Different Forest

This small painting was tough. I painted, scraped, repainted all last weekend and finally set it aside in disgust. The bottom image was the beginning, and the middle image was what I did when I returned to it mid week. I mostly covered it with random color. Then I started to move that around and this final forest came through.


oil on canvas board 14"x11"



Available Work

Shadows and Stream Study

A Daily painting from my residency at Whiskeytown. It looks to me like a Nathan Fowkes.


acrylic and oil on paper 7"x5"

Wet Winter Forest [after study]

A Daily painting.
When I`ve taught recently, it seems I`m often begging someone to stop. Less is more etc.
Here I decided to take my own advice. When I was so off the mark with the first larger version, I spent all weekend on a much smaller oil painting of the same composition. That didn`t work out at all, so I thought maybe watercolor. This is much closer to what I envisioned.


Watercolor on paper 10"x7"



Some Available Work

Sauvie Island Studies

From a couple of years ago.


watermedia on Yupo 6"x6"

Wet Winter Forest

This is not what I set out to paint, my original idea was hijacked. It has some of the tone I wanted but not the composition. There was a point where I just had to let it be this. I`m going to try again on a smaller scale.


Oil on canvas 30"x22"


Available Work

Bryant Woods Drawings

I was outside today drawing with Ruth Armitage in Bryant Woods. It was a sunny, perfect spring day. Although I believe it`s extremely important, I don`t draw much anymore. I never liked it particularly but I knew it was valuable. I now have a half baked theory that something critical happens in the brain when you look very closely at something and try to reproduce it. Something to do with memory. I know when I`m painting, I can cobble together a credible mountain or tree without a reference because I have studied them. I move the paint around until I recognize what I`m after.


pencil on paper 4"x2"

Wetlands Forest

From my walk on Minto Brown Island a week ago.
I wanted to say something about the bleak beauty of a quiet dormant wetland, with its monochromatic color and chaos of dense bare trees.



Oil on canvas 24"x40"



Available Work

Over the Sea 20

watercolor on paper 6"x6"