From the Mists II - Mountain Lion - 18x24 - Digital Painting - 2021

The story about this, the second in a stylistic series of wildlife focused paintings using a new technique I've recently developed, is perhaps more interesting than anything I could say about the inspiration. That part is simple. I live in Montana. We have large wild cats. They are amazing. This is a picture of one. That said, back to the interesting part. The first thing you should know is that I absolutely hate socializing, so I rarely get in-person feedback on my purely artistic endeavors. I was excited about this new idea, maybe just excited to have found some personal interest in painting again, and wanted to see others react to it. People are fascinating. Easy to figure out, impossible to understand. Anyway, I showed three people my elk painting and none of them could identify the elk. So... here I am, professional rejection taker who has heard it all, twice, and I'm genuinely stunned. I start to wonder if I'm surrounded by a pocket universe that is different than the universe ar