Who Turned Fauvist Painters Loose at the Creek?

High sun on low water

We walked through the forest down to the creek in glaring sunlight and, yowie, it looks like Les Fauves have been there, painting over parts of our fall creek scenery. We spooked ’em, they must have dropped loaded brushes and palettes full of paint into the water before vanishing from plein air into thin air. All the great colorists throughout history; Matisse, Derain, Van Gogh, Kandinsky, Gauguin, to name a few.

Easy drifting

Kidding! A big sunsmack did this, on the magic reflecting creek at low water. Roaring rays packing color. All increments and permutations are contained in raw sunlight. Those riffles in the foliage and water, those shifting shadows, the clattering dry leaves? Only a light breeze, and frogs. No one, no ghosts, are here.

Calming sparkle

Working together at the house, Bud the Editing Cat’s got something to say, “Those wild beasts are out there, I hear them and smell them. Just because you have sub-feline sensing mechanisms doesn’t mean the woods aren’t full of beasts.”

Currently colorful

“You don’t understand, I mean painters …”

Rapids exit

“Panthers?”

In the southeast US ‘painters’ and ‘panthers’ are old terms for mountain lions. The big cats are now generally thought to be absent here.

You wouldn’t believe how blue the sky is today

“Well, never mind. Umm, when did you learn French?”

Gathering in the shallows

Blink blink purrrr. His usual answer.

Splashy pathway

We were just leaves-ing

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“And what do you know about panthers? They were around before your time.”

Upstream densities

You are here

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Blink blink purrrr.

Bud seems to be an all-knowing old soul.

Leaf jam du jour

Stony creek bed below

The hues are quieter around Leaf Jam Island.

Jewel tones run in seams

Did ghost painters flee to the opposite bank?

Radiance waiting to be caught

Looking sideways from center

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What the spectrum leaves!

There is no photo editing on the creek and forest pictures, but I did enhance Bud’s pic. As chief editor of both word and photo editing, he wasn’t too pleased. During the process he meowed, “Whoa! Such a lead foot on the color pedal! Trying to get back to the 60s, are ya?”

Water circling

“Well I made sure you still look like an earth-toned chocolate panther with green eyes. And yeah, maybe I am. Just how do you know about the 60s? You were a kitten in 2001.”

Just for fun

Blink blink purrrr.

Where Bud and I sit, edit, and discuss, autumn seeps slowly into the trees standing just outside the house in the gold October light:

Wild Canopy

“And how could I see a mouse move through that mess of color? That’s just not realistic. It’s chromatic dissonance.”

Autumn’s stroll

“How do you know? You have two-color vision! It’s my understanding everything’s there in the photos, a recorded impression of a tonal continuum. You don’t see it until you play with brights, darks, color, and saturation in photo editing.” I try to explain.

Bud, erudite Editing Cat

“Dang, girl, I know all that. Let’s get back to reality. I still say there’s something or someone out there.”

“Just purr, Buddy.” This time I’m the one going blink blink.

For more on color in nature and cats, check out this post:

https://catwoodsporchparty.wordpress.com/2013/06/12/black-cats-in-sun-and-shade-a-painters-eye-view/