Kate Dempsey

This series of landscape paintings is the conclusion to a great adventure, but is also the beginning to the next. When I first began painting landscapes, they were of bright colorful beach scenes. Slowly they evolved into the mountainous terrains of Alabama and Georgia. This series is the reflection of my personal experience of surviving an EF3 tornado that ripped through Jacksonville, Alabama in March of 2018. They are a reminder that even on the dark and gloomy days there is still beauty. Storms are powerful, destructive and shouldn’t be underestimated, but they are also beautiful and after they clear, the world around us feels fresh and reborn. My hope is that these landscape paintings will evoke a capricious, moody and overwhelming feeling and as the viewer reaches the final painting, they will sense tranquility.

The first painting in the series, “Serene Rain and Fine Mist” depicts fog rolling in over the mountain tops. The sky is muddy and gloomy. The second painting, “Another Rainy Day”, portrays a place I travel passed often on 278 between my home in Georgia and my home away from home in Jacksonville, Alabama. On this day, the sun was rising, but you could only just barely make out the yellow tint under the fog.  Large rain clouds loomed over the terrain. The third painting in this series titled, “Sometimes the Sky Explodes,” shows an overwhelming and threatening storm cloud rolling over the terrain, yet you can still make out a sunset just behind it. The last painting, “Every Storm Runs Out of Rain,” captures a moment just after the storm has passed, and the rain clouds are leaving. It is meant to be a reminder that after a storm has come through there is still beauty and good to be found.