After completing the panoramic
"Hidden Nature" series, I continued to wonder about the issue of invisibility/hiding and exactly how far I had taken that - such that the figures perhaps have become a too-faint hallucination against the jungle foliage pattern. Had the background itself became the subjective foreground overwhelming a viewer's ability to decipher / discover the (intentionally concealed) subjects?
I set out to make work that in some ways was a visual simplification of "Hidden Nature." In these new pieces, the Forest Protectors would be less concealed, faces revealed within the chaotic canopy leaves and branches.
![](https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xZTBKX7VcSM/XgOkZru7dFI/AAAAAAAACXc/_1kzqWIN9kg97Kh2uowV1pGb0a3BGgP_wCLcBGAsYHQ/s320/forest%2Bspirits%2B01-s.jpg) |
Forest Spirits 01 |
![](https://1.bp.blogspot.com/--zeicr8kt2I/XgOkZrx5RzI/AAAAAAAACXY/D7ji0hupt_48IWGvVC9sVEGz4E9U7ahbACLcBGAsYHQ/s320/forest%2Bspirits%2B02-s.jpg) |
Forest Spirits 02 |
![](https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-5FJDBOFNJd8/XgOkZqDL5BI/AAAAAAAACXU/Fx1daJZJBCky8sMThJKHswPNBuqAXuqAgCLcBGAsYHQ/s320/forest%2Bspirits%2B03-s.jpg) |
Forest Spirits 03 |
![](https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-EkjH4HVdb7Q/XgOkaFmo7sI/AAAAAAAACXg/j7nDcnzrG7o0uiIqNj2C55L7C5KPZykCwCLcBGAsYHQ/s320/forest%2Bspirits%2B04-s.jpg) |
Forest Spirits 04 |
Follow-on note: for the Upstream Gallery's "Small Works 2020" show in January, I had these images output onto a metallic white paper, creating quite a nice optical depth.