While snowshoeing at the Von Trapp Resort in Stowe, Vermont one early spring, we came across horses gathering maple sap from the trees. Not to miss a "photo op", I followed them taking pictures along the way. When they stopped in front of the sugar house I knew I had found the perfect picture for a painting. Well, not so perfect - there weren't any trees with buckets in the nearby vicinity and I loved the way the maple buckets hung from the trees. When you are an artist you can tweak your subject matter and composition. I tell my students, "You can't put five legs on a horse (well, I guess you could...) but you can add or take away from your composition if it makes sense. This is, if you are a representational artist , as I am. So you can see how I changed my composition in the painting from the photo sources that I had.
