In storms, there is often danger, but also a powerful beauty; perhaps it is the combination of the two that makes the art of the storm so compelling.
Trackside artists have found much inspiration in a season of frequent storms.
Sharon Sandel came into the studio one rainy morning with an image in her mind of a Stormy Night — pale clouds and streaks of rain amid the dark — and she brought it to life that very day.
Photographer Susanna Euston’s striking black and white work Thunderstorm on the Blue Ridge Parkway is a massive roiling of clouds that dominate the mere streak of open sky and make the mountains seem small.
Donny Luke empowers light against dark in his watercolor Stormy Sunset, letting the sun’s rays offset the thunderheads, perhaps reminding us that storms, mighty as they may be, end in sunlight.
A storm in the abstract can be just as forceful, as Vince McGahan’s painting Ice Falls illustrates, with white ice shards on stony blue and black slashes imparting the frozen feel of deep winter.
Sandra Brugh Moore gives us a softer side of weather with a Winter Owl on a snowy branch, peering at us through a drifting snowfall.
IF YOU GO
Watercolorist Donny Luke’s works featured in April.
Trackside Studios, 375 Depot Street
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