Growing up in Idaho, Silas Thompson spent a lot of time backpacking with his father in the wilderness, becoming intimately acquainted with the paradoxes of nature—its beauty and the underbelly of decay that supports it; its inherent challenges and danger, and the rewards of persevering, like summitting a peak after an arduous climb.
Silas Thompson, Beauty Uphill, oil on canvas, 40 x 30”“I’m trying to create scenes that portray the foundational understanding that reality is actually beautiful,” says Thompson. “That includes difficulty and trials and trees that have fallen down and are rotting…As an artist, the continual struggle for me, and an ability I’m still developing, is how to take what I see and then make it into the story that can communicate that beauty.”
Thompson paints in a loose, impasto style with bold staccatos of color that leaves room for the viewer to participate and fill in the blanks with their own experience. “Hopefully that engages their imagination and makes them remember a certain moment in time or a particular feeling that is lost but hopefully a painting can call to mind.”
Two paintings in Mountain Verberations,an upcoming joint show with Jenna Von Benedikt at Gallery Wild, are a visual embodiment of the message Thompson wants to share.
Jenna Von Benedikt, Understanding, oil on panel, 15 x 30”
Beauty Uphill features an impressionistic thicket of aspen trees ablaze with fall color. “There’s this uphill imagery that we correlate with difficulty, but there’s still beauty in that,” he explains. “The logs that have fallen represent what the forest needs to survive.”
Marking Time is a more realistically rendered scene from the same Idaho mountain range during the last afternoon light. A fallen tree bisects the composition of standing aspens. “Someone told me once that ‘God hides truth where the wise in their own eyes don’t find it,’” says Thompson. “I think there’s a lot of truth in dead logs on the ground. I joke with an artist friend that I hope I’m remembered as the guy who painted dead logs.”
Rather than focus on the messages inherent in the landscape itself, fellow Idaho artist Jenna Von Benedikt explores the symbolism and role of its inhabitants—from the powerful bison to the whimsical, but rather fierce, hummingbird. Von Benedikt isn’t interested in depicting a specific place but creating the right atmosphere for her subject and of late, her abstracted backgrounds have been her primary focus.
Silas Thompson, Marking Time, oil on canvas, 60 x 48”
“It’s key to how the animal or subject will fit into the piece,” says Von Benedikt, who has been incorporating more graphic details and bolder color into her recent work. “I love the abstract side of it and feel like it’s an important part of the painting.”
In Alchemist at Play, a flurry of hummingbirds burst into the bright white light that makes them shine, the beating rhythm of their wings echoed in the dynamic blues and geometric shapes in the background.
“I love the little details,” the artist shares. “You can pick anything in nature and microscope into it and find it packed with interesting details,” she says. “There’s a lot to be seen that we often miss. Right now I’m really just diving into the details and the impact the contrasting colors and designs found in nature have on me and hopefully my viewers.”
Jenna Von Benedikt, Alchemist at Play, oil on panel, 30 x 38”
Understanding features two bison facing each other in a strong, sideways stance that captures the power of the iconic animal of the West in another abstracted space of contrasting whites and blues.
Having moved from Utah to an Idaho farm two years ago, Von Benedikt says, “I’m influenced a lot by skies now. I wasn’t ever looking up before and now I do. I’m surrounded by such a different environment now—so many plants and a creek—and that’s inspiring.” —
An opening reception for Mountain Verberations will be held June 15 from 4 to 7 p.m. at Gallery Wild in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. —
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