Wishing you a Merry Christmas
Through his words and his painting, artist Tom Lynch is wishing for a calm and peaceful Christmas this year.
The renowned watercolorist has created a new painting to grace the front page of the Daily Herald for the last 32 years.
Lynch, who now lives in Oswego but formerly lived in Arlington Heights, was once commissioned to create a Daily Herald Christmas card. The editors liked it so much that they had to share it with all the readers on the front page.
“It’s become a tradition, and I love the challenge of doing something unique and different each time to surprise the viewer,” Lynch said.
Lynch said this year’s painting reflects what he’s hoping for this Christmas season.
“I’m kind of taking a step back from all the holiday activity to something simple and quiet, a soft touch of the holidays,” he said. “And the painting is something you would barely think of as a Christmas scene right away. But I wanted to get back to the basics of the feeling of just being at home with friends and family instead of rushing out for that next sale.”
Lynch said he’s always looking for what might inspire him for his next painting, taking pictures of things that will influence what flows through his brushes.
“Even now, as I’m going around holidaying, I’m looking to what might be used next year,” he said.
Then he’ll sit down with the pictures he’s amassed and take a little from each to sketch a scene, as he did this year. He’s also been teaching a class on side lighting, so he incorporated the lessons for his students into his own work.
How long does it take?
“Fifty years of practice, and amazingly weeks later I can get it done,” he said with a laugh.
Lynch said his gallery exhibitions are made up of series of paintings, sometimes of the same scene over a period of time, say sunset to sunrise.
Doing an individual painting presents its own challenge.
“It’s kind of a change of pace from the stuff that I’m doing all the time, both the teaching (he teaches classes online) and the studio paintings,” he said. “The challenge is looking at an ordinary scene and making it special, making it unique.”
Lynch has been painting for over 50 years and has written more than a half dozen books. He’s long been a teacher and previously hosted painting classes on PBS.
“We had Bill Alexander and Bob Ross, and then I had my own little thing over here, Tom Lynch Watercolor,” he said.
He hopes readers enjoy this year’s offering.
“What I’m trying to do is suggest something and let (the readers’) imagination finish it off,” he said. “Different people will see different things, and that’s the beauty of it.”