Brian Rounds Artist Statement

Art has the power to instill in us a sense of belonging. When I was growing up in California, rapid suburban development resulted in a dichotomous landscape — places of commerce intermixed with patches of land left somewhat wild. While the grid of technology and commodity provides many benefits, the forests, creeks, and trails present something indispensable: contact with what is ancient and nameless.

My landscape paintings offer a sanctuary, a meditation, a place where perhaps one can lose oneself in the contours of nature. I seek places that inspire me with harmonies of composition, tone, and color, and there begins the process of building a small reflection of the world before me—an absorbing task urged on by the gradual and changing passage of light. Through the act of painting outdoors, I hope to express the unique and mysterious pull that landscape holds when we take time to feel a connection to it.

Not unlike the American luminists, who explored nature’s mysteries by rendering light and color in spatially expansive landscapes, I strive to make light palpable and offer the viewer a sense of wonder and engagement with the natural world.