I can work on a painting for a long while until it finally reaches a state in which I feel that it’s done, completed and finished entirely. Many other works have been easier to complete probably because they are done on a smaller scale and there’s less investment of time, energy and materials. They look more spontaneous and I like that, but I also like the well considered and carefully crafted qualities of my larger works that can have 100 or more hours of work and energy spent on them. That is what this picture is. I wasn’t too sure I liked it a while ago until I positioned it in just the right place on a square wall in my house. And then finally it reached a critical balance between image and the setting it is viewed in that I found really worked. I called it a Tranquil Repose as that’s really what the subject represents to me and what it feels like to visit in person. It’s largely impressionism as a style description, but not one that I consciously strive for at all, just a result of the setting and the way my hand applied the paint. Still, I do look at and appreciate the work by the big names in Impressionism of the past century, but get equally excited when I come upon lesser known artists who worked or are still working in that manner and pursuing imagery and creating atmosphere in the same way. This one is 48 inches square, on stretched canvas and completed in the fall of last year.
Oleg Osipoff 