Sacred Places

Secret places, hidden gems, mystery...I am drawn like a magnet to these things and I hope it comes through in my paintings. Ireland abounds with them and I was blessed to experience the reverence and awe of ancient stones: monuments to people who lived eons ago. I chose five to paint as a collection and kept them unified by size and a tetrad color palette (red-violet, yellow-green, blue-violet, yellow-orange) Besides the reality that almost everything looks mossy green, I thought that hue brought out the age and mystery of these sacred sites. The large photos are of the paintings and the small ones are my reference photos...so you can judge how well I did in capturing what I saw and felt.

Muckross Abbey is the ruins of a Franciscan Friary and this painting is of the Cloister Walk that surrounds the now roofless central cloister where an enormous, ancient Yew tree grows and the light pours in through the beautiful stone arches. 
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Though the roof is gone, Muckross Abbey is still in an amazing state of preservation. There are beautiful arched doorways and spiral staircases to sturdy upper floors. Surrounding the ruins are the thickly forested shores of Lough Leane, adding to the enchantment of the place. I wanted to highlight the lovely intricate window so darkened the foreground wall to lead the eye.

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Just outside of Limerick, in County Clare, is Bunratty Castle and Folk Park. The castle was amazing, filled with all kinds of secrets, but was caught my attention was a small wall shrine of Mary and baby Jesus. It was a place for the faithful to pray and leave a coin in Mary's hand. I painted it from slightly to one side to take advantage of the shadow line directing the eye. 

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You can see that I painted it again, this time a close-up, to capture the aged and weathered stone and the coin in Mary's palm. I used the palette knife a little more in this one to show how the rain and moisture had grooved the stone. This small shrine was quite easy to miss on the grounds and there was very little information about it, leaving me to wonder what prayers and hopes had been placed there in the past.

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Towards the end of our Ireland trip we visited the Glendalough Monastic Site, outside of Dublin. Located in the Wicklow mountains and national park, it is an awesome, iconic place to see. The ruins and cemetery clearly show the passage of time and the brevity of our lives, as in the New Testament book of James: "You do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away" James 4:14

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You are appreciated!!