Nancy Merkle

Sunny Day, Oil Painting

2019

Artist Comments
Artist Valerie Berkely presents a fiery sunset above thick silhouetted trees. The warm rays of the sun brighten the landscape with cooling hues of violet spreading across the forest floor. With her finger painting technique, Valerie uses transparent oils on top of gold iridescent acrylic textures creating a luminescent glow. It results in a captivating image with a gentle flow of movement.

About the Artist
Valerie Berkely uses her finger tips as brushes to create her abstract paintings. For Valerie, the art is all about the process, the paint, her mood, and the moment. She admires the artist Wolf Kahn, who once said, “the picture is the conclusion of an experiment in which the hint of an image becomes actuality." Like Kahn, Valerie’s paintings combine pictorial landscapes with painterly abstraction. The vibrant primary colors capture the hues of the sun rising and setting, and the texture of her fingers across the surface divides sea, land, and sky. There is something very dreamy about these works, exemplified by their color, texture, and atmospheric quality. Valerie’s first “art epiphany” was seeing Seurat's La Grande Jatte at the Art Institute of Chicago. “Bowled me over! I actually fell down. And I knew I was to become a painter.”

Words that describe this painting: small, trees, sunlight, sun, sunset, oilpaint, nature, forest, impressionism, etching, impressionism, nature, oil painting, purple

Golden Glow...

Artist Comments
"This piece is inspired by the difficult traverse of a dramatic, jagged ridgeline," says artist Crystal DiPietro. A high vantage point offers an expansive view of veined mountains. The sun's rays glow golden on one side while cool shadows of purple fall between the deep crevices. "Despite its rugged appearance, the ridge seemed to have a harmonic rhythm."

About the Artist
Many artists work with the landscape, but Crystal DiPietro sees her works as different from most in the genre. "I tend not to see landscapes as soft and pretty, but as rugged, dramatic and colorful." Many of her works depict wild storms and moody sunsets. She spends a lot of time in remote spots and uses layers of color to create her compositions. Her work hovers between a brief impression of a scene and a pure dream. Crystal's landscapes of southern Utah seem to undulate and continuously change. What's interesting, though, is that these mountains and valleys seem to do the same thing in person. In these areas, the view changes constantly throughout the day as the light shifts, throwing shadows of faces, mazes and alien patterns across the cliff faces. Crystal impressively captures what's there, and what seems to be but isn't.

Words that describe this painting: ridge, ridgeline, mountains, desert, southwest, west, western, southwestern, viewpoint, impressionism, sunlight, shadow, oilpaint, landscape, impressionism, landscape, western, oil painting, yellow

The Brute...