After spending 4.5 years in Wyoming, I decided to relocate to be closer to family. Leaving your first home away from home uproots a lot of sentimentality, everything that I had built in my life there had been completely from scratch. I’d gone from moving there, not knowing anyone, to leaving years later with a very full heart.

I decided to leave artwork with a few cherished friends. Out of three paintings that I made, this one is the only one I really deem portfolio-worthy because of the composition. I was beginning to learn about value sketches and using value to create focal points in artwork before painting this, so it has more technical application than my other pieces left out West.

What I learned is that the eye is naturally drawn to the parts of the painting that have the highest contrast between darks and light. To get an idea of the different values, try squinting when you look at the painting.

Can you see the focal point?