Morning light

One morning last winter, I rose in the dark to photograph the first rays of the sun hitting the trees and fields just around the corner from my home. It was 22° outside (not much for my relatives in Sweden, Alaska, and Minnesota, but it's news here), and ice clung to the grasses, the trees, and the vines, shimmering as the first rays of light hit them.



I warmed up the colors in the paintings - I wanted them to be about morning, rather than about winter. The ice sparkling before it melted gave the scenes a shimmer and the shadows a blueness and beauty different from any other time of the day or the year. There is a third painting in the series, which I still have to photograph. I love them enough to consider rising in the dark and cold again some day this next winter, just to see what I find. That's something, for me....