After thinking about it for several years, I finally enrolled in a local beginner watercolor class two summers ago. I repeated the class last summer and will likely do it again - to learn new tricks and relearn forgotten ones. I had taken and enjoyed a sketching and an oil painting class at Dartmouth, found myself somewhat constrained by my engineering mentality, and had done nothing since. I chose watercolors because I like the potential for transparency and dreamlike wispiness. I am struggling to move from a rather finite portrayal of objects to a freeform relationship of colors, values, and shapes - from which the objects naturally appear.

At this stage my renderings are mostly class related projects and are often my interpretation of photos. I think I learned about plagiarism at Dartmouth, so credit to the sources follows: "Don't Fence Me In" - David Stoecklein photo; "Rendezvous" and "Ranch Hand" - Barbara Meikle oils: "Half Dome at Dusk" - Stephen Lyman oil.

I hope to continue this adventure as I spend less time in an airplane, on skis, and on my horse.

                                                 --  Glenn Gemelli