Sunset, Monday, 5 October 2009

William Theodore Van Doren. Stony Point, Albemarle County, Va. Oil on paper, 16 x 20.

Tonight was almost about as clear as it gets (that’s exactly how I wanted to say it) – no pattern discernible anywhere, an even gradation from bright rose gold through an undifferentiated blue.

The predominant oaks around here go pretty directly to brown, or, if we’re lucky, a sort of rust – russet rust. But today in the old cut-over fields by the Rivanna it seemed the leaves of the little blackjack oaks were still partly green, and also blotched red, yellow, gold, orange, all at once, in patterns of color so delicately balanced they were like paintings. A painting can almost suspend your vision, often you don’t focus on just one thing, the whole piece holds your attention in a sort of trance – like a hypnotic screen you see through to something much greater than just the image that seems to be there. A van Eyck can do that for me, a Cézanne always does, just as a Jackson Pollock can, the style or era doesn’t matter.

As for the little delta-shaped blackjack leaves, I’m not sure their patterns are really quite like paintings, or if I just see paintings they suggest. Probably the latter. If the leaves themselves were the paintings, I wouldn’t feel any need to make a painting of them. I stuck a leaf in my pocket and brought it home.