I always knew my surroundings inspired me. What I didn't realize was how much they were influencing the work itself. Working between my two art studios—one on Lake St. Clair and one in the foothills of the Ozarks—has made that influence much easier to see.

For years, I worked primarily from my Lakehouse studio, on the edge of Lake St. Clair, surrounded by water, open sky, changing light and an almost constant horizon. More recently, I added a second studio at our Treehouse in the foothills of the Ozarks—a completely different environment of woods and rocky bluffs, mountain biking and walking trails, waterfalls, and wildlife that regularly wanders through.

I expected the studios to feel different. What I didn't expect was to begin seeing those differences show up in my work.

The Lakehouse

My dad once told me that when you live on the water, every time you look out, it's different. I've thought about that often over the years because he was absolutely right.

The lake can be an enormous field of blue one day and nearly disappear into a gray horizon the next. In winter, it freezes into fractured shapes and shifting layers of white and gray. The sky can turn the water pink, orange or lavender, sometimes for only a few minutes before everything changes again.  

Even the horizon, which seems like the one constant, changes depending on light, weather and season.

I photograph it constantly—not necessarily because I'm going to paint what I've photographed, but because something has made me stop and look. A color combination. A reflection. An unexpected line. The way ice breaks apart or clouds stack above the horizon.  For a long time, this was simply the environment in which I worked. I don't think I fully understood how much all that looking was training my eye.

Then Came the Treehouse

The Treehouse couldn't be more different.

Instead of looking across an open horizon, I'm surrounded by woods. There are rocky bluffs and layers of exposed stone, waterfalls cutting through them, tangled branches, trails disappearing into the trees, and wildlife everywhere.  The deer have become especially hard not to notice. They wander through regularly, sometimes alone and sometimes in groups, and I've found myself learning their markings, their habits and even their individual personalities. But they're only part of it. There are owls tucked almost invisibly into branches, changing leaves, moss, rock, water and countless little things that reveal themselves only when you pay attention. And maybe that's what feels most different here.

There is so much layering. Trees behind trees. Branches crossing branches. Animals partially obscured by the woods. Rock strata stacked on top of one another. Water moving over and veiling the stone beneath it. It's a very different visual language from the openness of the lake.

What Comes Back Into the Studio

The interesting part is that my actual studio process hasn't changed very much.

I still build paintings through layers of color, texture and marks. I cover things up and reveal them again. I work intuitively, letting one decision lead to another and allowing the painting to change as I work. What has changed is that I'm now moving between two dramatically different environments. And having the second studio has made me recognize something I couldn't see when I only had one: how much of the outside world follows me back inside. Not necessarily in what I paint. I'm not trying to reproduce a waterfall or a sunset on canvas.

It's more subtle than that.

It's what catches my attention—the relationship between two unexpected colors, a partially hidden shape, the repetition of a line, a reflection, a weathered surface, a huge area of quiet next to something dense and complicated. Those observations become part of the visual vocabulary I carry into the studio, whether I'm conscious of them at the time or not.

In a strange way, I thought I was simply adding a second place to make art. Instead, having two studios has given me enough contrast to begin seeing how much place has been part of my process all along.

And now that I've noticed it, I'm curious to see where it takes the work next.