12″ x 18″ Oil on masonite panel

This painting has an interesting story behind it. The base of the painting is from a drawing I did on the masonite panel somewhere around 15-18 years ago. I found it when I was going through some boxes of old work. I am not sure why I kept it but I decided this was another opportunity to play around with oils. I’m still in the learning stages of how to paint with oils. So this has been on my easel for awhile and I have done a few smaller paintings while I worked on this one. Partly because I couldn’t decide how to handle certain parts of the painting. Like the house in the background. I also went out and took some new reference shots of the tree in the fall to have some up-to-date reference materials. This tree is in front of Founders Hall on the campus of Ashland University. I have always loved these old pines and obviously wanted to paint them for a long time. The house in the background is the Gill Center which is also part of the University campus. No, the owl wasn’t really there either time. I am not sure why I placed the owl there other than I was into wildlife art back in my early days when I drew this on the panel. So I decided to finish it that way. Now I need to decide how to frame it and what to do with it. It may be time to start looking for some ways to show my art.