I was honored to have three of my paintings selected for the show, as the competition was stiff. I was so surprised and pleased when my name was announced as the first place winner with a cash award of $1000. The juror selected my painting Adaptation as the winner. Hooray!
The setting for this piece emerged from one of my many sojourns to Summer Lake Wildlife Refuge near Paisley, Oregon. The sheer magnitude and inevitability of bird migrations inspire me. If anything is sacred it is the way these beautiful avian creatures mysteriously appear and then disappear from the dormant late winter landscape. The piercing beauty of the birds in the stark cold neutrals of this desert oasis moves me into a deep peace.
I feel the history of this fragile place in an almost tangible way that leads me to thinking about the future. Relentlessly, the growing populations of people with their subsequent need for development threaten this ancient system. What if there were no birds left? How can we decide whose world is more important, theirs or ours? Or perhaps a better question is, are we really separate from the rest of the inhabitants of this earth?
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