Beach By Philip Barlow, Oil Painting

With rich strokes of oil paint, Philip Barlow renders beachside snapshots in mesmerizing blurs of bokeh, as if shot through unfocused camera lenses. His style eschews inconsequential compositional details in favor of accentuated ambience, smudging the scenes into soft smears of color while honing crisp, shimmering circles from each spot where sun rays reach earth. He conveys not so much the shore as the muted memory of it—the pure essence of its sensations, from the haze of humidity to the tingled touch of the salty breeze, ever-shifting with the tides.