Before it Cools - 80 × 80 × 4 cm / 31.5 × 31.5 × 1.6 in
This summer, Europe hasn't just been hot. Wildfires have broken out earlier and more often than usual, smoke has drifted over cities that rarely see it, and heat records have fallen one after another. Trees responded early — turning rust-colored weeks ahead of autumn, shedding leaves as a defense against losing too much water. Not dying. Adapting to conditions they didn't choose.
I noticed this on the walks I take almost every evening with a friend, through the park near our homes. We go before the heat fully lifts, while the sky still holds a cold, unwarmed blue — the kind it carries before it turns gold for sunset. A few steps past the stressed trees, there's a rose bush. It's been blooming through the entire heatwave, dense and full, as if the season hadn't asked anything difficult of it at all — when clearly it had.
That contrast is what stayed with me. Nobody was asking the trees to stop shedding leaves, and nobody was asking the roses to stop blooming. Both were simply responding, honestly, to a summer neither of them chose. No resistance in either response. No sense that things should be different than they were.
This canvas holds both of those honest responses. Rust-orange roses, built up with the palette knife until they had enough weight to hold their own against the cold-blue ground. Violet blossoms gathered in one corner. Pale pink petals scattered on the other side.
I don't know if the trees in that park will fully recover once the heat breaks. But the roses were still blooming the last time I walked past. I think that's worth noticing — not as proof that everything is fine, but as a reminder that nature keeps adapting and keeps finding ways to continue, whether we're paying attention or not. Maybe the least we owe it is to notice. And to be a little more careful with what we're asking it to survive.
Medium: Acrylic on 100% linen canvas
Dimensions: 80 × 80 × 4 cm / 31.5 × 31.5 × 1.6 in
Year: 2026
Signed and dated by the artist
Comes with Certificate of Authenticity