About the Painting 

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I knew that I wanted to paint something magical that made me feel like childhood. As I painted this live over a few events, the orchard began to reveal itself and the fire flies lit up.

The more I shared the painting with the audience, the more I learned about the elements of the painting.

 

One of the most beautiful stories I heard, was about the tree that a very special orchard grows on. The rainforest there gets so much rain that the massive trees eventually develop small puddles in parts of the trunk/large branches. With the extreme heat, water from the floor below is evaporated and sometimes, tadpoles or fish eggs are evaporated with that water into the sky and later rain down on the forest.

 

A few lucky eggs wind up in the tree trunk puddle and grow into fish/ frogs. They may think their entire world is that puddle suspended so high in the sky but little do they know there is a larger pond below, a much bigger river and eventually a whole ocean.

 

Sometimes the beauty of life (and painting) is just putting one foot in front of the next and letting it unfold in front of you. When I painted this piece, my house flooded and revealed tons of black mold (that doesn’t happen much in Colorado) and I separated with my partner in life and creativity after many years. All of the pillars in my life were crumbling. This painting was truly medicine for me. It reminded me of the beauty of trusting life and the magic of following an unknown path. And just like the story of the orchard, magical synchronicities and opportunities arrived beyond my wildest dreams.