The Harmony of Contrasts: Pier Cove Winter
16 × 20 inches, Oil on Linen Board, 2026

On a February evening at Pier Cove, ice dunes rose along the shoreline of Lake Michigan, while the partially frozen lake stretched toward the horizon beneath a dramatic sky of deep blues and turbulent clouds. A band of golden light illuminated the horizon, its warm colors reflected across the ice and patches of open water, bringing an unexpected radiance to the winter landscape. The contrasts were striking—cold and warmth, darkness and light, foreboding and invitation—yet each contributed to the extraordinary beauty of the moment.

What moved me most was not simply the contrast between these opposing forces, but their simultaneous presence. The warmth did not diminish the foreboding, nor did the darkness overcome the light. Instead, their coexistence created a beauty that neither could have produced alone. It was this unexpected harmony of contradictions that I wanted to capture in the painting.