The idea for these paintings came about in an unusual manner. A painter friend visited my studio several years ago and looked at my landscape paintings covering many of the walls. Later, I received an email from him with what I felt to be rather extreme advice.

He suggested that of my typical landscape paintings, I take the best 25% area of the painting and use that to create another (hopefully) superior painting. This advice came after several years of my Colorado painting advisor telling me what parts (if not all parts) of a given work should be eliminated. She often suggested I trim a painting down from the original size saving only the best part.

With this collective advice making a real impression on me, I painted three dozen 12" x 12" works based upon the most successful sections of previously executed paintings. This process continued for another couple of years.

The results are displayed in Part I of this boo,, with the original landscape paintings on the left and with what I call the Sweet Spot versions on the right.

The paintings completed after my sweet spot exercises are in Part II.