Golden Hour
by Wendy Greenhut
The artist creates abstract paintings that are driven more by intuition and feeling than by a strict plan. Each piece usually starts with a loose idea—sometimes it’s a color combination, other times it’s simply a mood or feeling—and then grows naturally from there. Through layering, scraping back, covering, and revealing, the work develops in an organic way. Part of what interests her most is allowing the painting to hold onto its own history, where earlier marks, textures, and decisions can still be felt beneath the surface. Having lived in Florida, the Adirondacks, and now the Hudson Valley, landscape has become an important influence on her work. The tropical light and saturated colors of Florida, the forests and seasonal changes of the Adirondacks, and the softer, atmospheric landscape of the Hudson Valley continue to shape her sense of color, texture, and movement. The changing light, weather, and trees outside her studio window often guide the direction of a painting without her fully realizing it at first. Some paintings move toward bold, energetic combinations with reds, yellows, and darker tones, while others become softer and quieter, built around muted greens, blues, grays, and warm neutrals. No matter the palette, there is always an effort to find a balance between something emotional and expressive while still feeling calm and visually resolved. Rather than telling viewers exactly what to see, she wants the work to feel open and personal, allowing each person to connect with it in their own way and discover something different over time.
