Julia Sutliff
I think of my subject as “nature,” the wilder the better. Nature left uninterrupted, unspoiled, not built upon, not sculpted by humans. Trees at the borders of open meadows, streams through untended woods, fields where grasses, briers, and wildflowers are left to run riot. Wild or undeveloped nature contains the visual imagery that moves me most, and makes me want to paint.
What I’m drawn to in nature has to do in part with relationship, gesture, and emotion. To my eyes, trees stand, reach, and lean; ridges survey, fields recline; rivers sleep or journey, and so on. I tend to like compositions that feel inviting or enveloping, and that have an element of intimacy.
The experience of looking at nature is thrilling – the movement, the shadows, the play of light – it’s a whirlwind of sensation and emotion. My feeling is that it’s not enough to take the elements of a scene and copy them. Better to invent: to try to match the unfolding drama and flux with the movement of your brush, with your half-complete impressions, with your choice of color, choice of brush, etc. It’s the only way to attempt to match wits with nature – to make a painting come even close to being as exciting to look at as is nature itself.
And it seems important to try to work with what Corot called “confidence,” Van Gogh “brio,” and Delacroix “extreme daring.” We want to be free from fear, and perhaps when we see fearlessness in an artist’s work, it moves us as would any act of daring, or passionate abandon, or selflessness, or love.