Shelah Horvitz - I'll Take You There

"Apple Trees". Oil on wood, 24" x 18"

My series, "I'll Take You There", is about change. The paintings portray the play of large forces and their relationship to the individual and the interplay between the transitory and the permanent. They are meditations on uncertainty, on mystery, and on stability.

"Mist". Oil on wood, 12" x 12"

"Covered". Oil on wood, 18" x 18"

"Remote". Oil on wood, 18" x 18"

"Afternoon". Oil on wood, 16" x 16"

"Ring". Oil on wood, 12" x 16"

"The Jumping-Off Point". Oil on wood, 14" x 14"

"Tree Dance". Oil on wood, 16" x 12"

"Obfuscation". Oil on wood, 22" x 10"

"Foresight." Oil on wood, 16" x 16"

"Tumbledown Mountain from Dummer's Beach". Oil on Church Pew, 18" x 32", Collection of Weld Historical Society, Weld, Maine

One elusive thing I have been chasing is to to paint what I would call "happy deep". If you examine most art and literature, the pieces with depth and an understanding of life tend to be sad. The pieces that are happy, that pick you up, tend to be superficial. A piece that is happy but deep is rare because to be able to make such a piece, you have to have endured difficulties and passed through to the other side. You have to have come to a place of informed optimism, where you understand evil but you also understand that it is not the full picture and also that nothing lasts. A happy deep piece is meant to be a beacon to those who are stuck in their own darkness, a reminder that even evil passes, even evil has its friability.