A Kind of Wonder

24 × 18 in. | Watercolor on paper | 2026
Available, unframed

I painted this after spending a few days on Nantucket, where I became slightly obsessed with the window boxes. They were everywhere, and people clearly put real thought into them—not just making them pretty, but making each one feel different. Dense greens, unexpected color combinations, things spilling out, things standing upright, some carefully structured and others almost unruly.

I took a lot of pictures.

I wasn’t trying to paint a window box, but I think some of that stayed with me when I started this piece. The greens came first, then the pinks and ochres. I kept working back into it—softening some areas, burying others, letting a few darker marks stay exposed. What emerged was this interesting contrast between all the activity around the edges and the quieter space in the middle.

What I like most now is the surface itself. There are places that feel almost worn away and others that are much more direct. From a distance, your eye follows the movement around the painting. Up close, there are all these smaller passages that keep changing depending on where you look.

A glimpse of the process: I’m working on A Kind of Wonder in the video at the top of the Studio Notes page.