The Sperryville Maple

The Sperryville Maple, watercolor, 14" x 13.5"

Last year I finally got around to visiting the Sperryville Maple, one of the trees featured in "Remarkable Trees of Virginia," a beautiful book that I found in our local library shortly after moving here. The book has proved to be such a great resource that I finally purchased a copy for myself, with the idea of trying to visit some of the trees featured in it in order to make portraits of them.

The Sperryville maple is a sugar maple that is estimated to have been growing in the front yard of a private residence since the 1890's, making it about 130 year old at present. The tree has been a local landmark in the small community of Sperryville for many years. Its massive trunk has apparently lost several major limbs since the book's publication in 2008, but it's still impressive. Here's what it looks like from the other side of Main Street.

Photo of Sperryville maple

I photographed the tree from several angles and chose my particular viewpoint to emphasize the massiveness of its trunk looking upward into the leafy canopy. Last year was not the best year for autumn color in our area, and the tree had probably not reached the peak of color when I photographed it, but I find this particular stage when the leaves are turning, when there is still a little bit of green in the lower shade leaves, to be one of the most attractive. At this point the leaves display the widest range of colors possible.

I worked from my photos, but I lost track and only took one photo of my progress along the way. I started with very watery washes of yellow, let that dry, then a wash with red and after that was dry, a last wash with blue. These first layers established the areas of light and dark overall, then the trunk and branches were gradually darkened.

Painting at an early stage

After each layer dried, I laid on more layers of pigment, with each successive layer being drier until the desired density of color was reached. The blue sky was added almost at the last minute, after which the surrounding edges were cleaned and heightened. I plan to show the painting at Art at the Mill's fall show this year. Look for the show opening on Sept. 28, 2019, and continuing for the next three weekends until Oct. 13, 2019.