I didn’t bring oil paints to Colorado but did bring a compact watercolor set-up and painted every day. I’m working to improve my paintings of aspen trees. Here are a few paintings from this trip.
On this visit to Colorado, it was very noticeable that there were more Aspen in areas that had had bark beetle damage to evergreens. Like so many things, it’s a cycle. Small evergreens grow among Aspen eventually crowding out the light. The evergreens succumb to avalanche or fire or beetles and make way for aspen.
I am going to the Plein Air Convention in Denver in May so will certainly have a chance of more Aspen paintings then. Plus there is always my backyard birch tree which makes a pretty good stand-in.
