I painted this in 1992, using oils and the wet-on-wet technique. The black border is black gesso, with which I had coated the entire canvas.
I didn’t have much room for painting in the house we had moved into in Aberdeen, Washington, and I only had a small easel, so I was using mainly canvas panels. This one is 14″ x 18″ Looking at the original painting, I can’t see the grain of the canvas, but for some reason, no matter how I try to take the picture, the grain shows through, and the shadows aren’t as deep as they are in the actual painting.
Still, it’s one of my favorites, and it does show some of the techniques used, and I thought I’d share it. Maybe I can get someone to get a better photo of it someday.
As for the setting, this was painted from wisps of memory from long long ago, of when I still lived in Alaska. The scene is similar to the terrain up near the top of Thompson Pass, on the Richardson Highway, between Valdez and Glenallen, Alaska. We used to visit Blueberry Lake up there in the summer, where we would picnic, wade in the water, and pick berries. Even though the lake is close to the summit, you can still see very tall mountain peaks all around.
My brother, Gary Minish, has taken some fantastic photographs of the area that inspired this painting. You can check it out at his 500PX photo gallery entitled Thompson Pass.
