I moved back to the mountains of Western North Carolina in 2012. It was a time of great upheaval in my life. The embrace that the mountains offered me was not just consoling: it was essential. I began painting celebratory landscapes of the space outside my studio. A poplar grove in a north/south cove. Towering trees reached to the sky, but my view was of the trunks and the ridge behind. There was no horizon. There was only this in front of me.