Interrupting Green

Medium: Acrylic on canvas panel
Size: 5X7 inches
Location: Big Thicket National Preserve, Texas
Year: 2025

This original en plein air painting was created on location during an Artist-in-Residence at Big Thicket National Preserve in Texas, capturing a quiet, heavily shaded landscape where dense greens and dark tones dominate the scene. Staff placed this cone to remind everyone that an active wasp nest was in the stump.

Painted outdoors and in real time, the piece reflects the layered textures and depth of the environment, with loose, expressive brushwork building the surrounding grasses and foliage.

At the center, a single bright orange cone interrupts the field of green—placed to mark and warn of a nearby wasp nest. This unexpected presence draws the eye and shifts the balance of the composition, introducing a moment of human intervention within an otherwise undisturbed environment.

The work explores the tension between harmony and disruption, where a subtle landscape is defined by one striking and purposeful detail.