Sunset on the Ottertail River – Painting of the Week

Have you ever stopped in your tracks just to take a photo of a beautiful sunset? Paul and I did exactly that for this one.

Generally, it’s the light dancing across the clouds that makes a sunset truly breathtaking. Sunsets have always held a special place in my artistic journey; back in high school, my very first award-winning watercolor was a sunset. I remember fussing over how to paint the scrub brush until I finally turned my brush sideways, using a dry-brush technique to scraggle them in. I looked at it and thought, “That looks okay!”

Sunset on the Ottertail River is my first sunset painted in acrylic, and it brought its own unique set of challenges – particularly the abundance of reeds. Because acrylic dries so quickly, capturing this subject requires swift, swooping, smooth brushstrokes and layers of transparent glazes. Creating the landscape demanded considerable care, patience and subtle value changes.

The real trick to a successful sunset painting is the silhouette. While a silhouette is mostly very dark with little variation in value, its shape is significant. The outlines need to be highly descriptive, organic, and interesting to catch the viewer’s eye. For this piece, the long, horizontal format of the canvas perfectly enhanced the foreground, allowing the shapes to breathe.

Mid-Summer Trees has been accepted into the American Watercolor Society 2026 Associate Online Exhibition. The Exhibition will be on the AWS YouTube channel, from June 25 – August 30.