Description
My father planted this tree in our family yard in the early 70’s – it is now quite a tree. This image came from a November day when my niece, Amanda and I spent some time taking photos in my parents’ garden. It was gently warm and the light was soft. The blue-black of these very ripe olives combined with the grey-greens and ochres is a new, somehow more masculine palette – a welcome addition in my body of work. I finished this painting while on vacation in Tahoe with my parents. It was really fun to share the process with my dad. And, he helped me name it over coffee one morning with his reminiscences of being a young boy sitting up in the immense olive tree at his grandparents’ in the Central Valley and of a song from Kismet about a fool sitting beneath an olive tree.
July 2009
