The Artist's Road Painting the World's Beautiful Places

This Side of the Mystery

The Dance of Spring     30 x 40"     Oil on Linen     © AW Trusty

Art is the increasing effort to compete

with the beauty of flowers—

and never succeeding.

               - Marc Chagall

   These words from Chagall strike a note as I prepare for my exhibition titled, The Side of the Mystery. It is a privilege to be an artist, to live in the country and to immerse myself in the Nature all around me that provides glimpses and delights of dazzling beauty. My work is to whisk away the buzzing bees of distraction in my head, to see beyond the clatter, to listen, to honor, to celebrate the beauty and to try to translate these impressions and feelings into paint.

   Colors, flowers, changing leaves, butterflies, birds—all seem to me to be emissaries—here to remind us of the greater beauty that we can sense perhaps, but are not equipped to see in all its interwoven magnificence, on this side of the mystery. Their spring arrival can fill us with hope and an appreciation of the eternal cycles of life in which we too, play an integral part. Their ephemerality and fragility, from bud to scattered brown petals, can be a prompt to appreciate our own brief lives. We'll never know the answers to why beauty exists or why it speaks to us. Perhaps the best we can do is to enjoy the gift.

Black and White     10 x 30"     Oil on Linen     © AW Trusty

   For those of you unable to join us at the exhibition opening at the Cider Gallery in Lawrence, KS, you can visit my website, Ann Trusty Fine Art, to see some of the paintings included. A catalog accompanies the show and is available here: