Wendell Berry Sketch

THE PEACE OF WILD THINGS 

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free. 

— Wendell Berry

Wendell Berry is considered by many to be one of America's greatest living poets. I was approached a few weeks back to create artwork for an interesting project that sets Berry's poems to music in a double CD package. The challenge was to come up with a scene that combines the best of portrait and regionalist landscape and throw in a couple of nuggets for Berry fans. The painting will be used on two different discs as well as a biographical and lyric booklet, so I needed to come up with a composition that allows for three separate crops. The plan also includes making collector prints of the painting as well which I am painting in oil. I will post more as the project moves along.