"View from Lake Lawsona" by Brenda Hofreiter

This painting was created while I was searching for a view of downtown Orlando for their annual "Paint the Town" competition. One of my favorite things about the city of Orlando is all the wonderful lakes. Most of them are old sinkholes that have filled in with water, but they are lovely and dot the cityscape.

I chose to paint this scene because I was attracted to the way the way the city high-rises were peeking over the tops of the trees. This was painted in morning light and you can see the light just slipping over the tops of the trees and lighting up the right sides of the buildings. I loved the beautiful fall leaves of the lakeside cypress and managed to capture the autumn wind breaking up the colorful tree reflections in the water. Quite a challenge, but I like the results. My friend and fellow painter, Cynthia Edmonds, snapped a photo of me while I was painting this and I've put it down below if you'd like to see the artist at work.

This painting was chosen for the "Paint the Town" competition along with another painting I created of the Cracker Farm at Turkey Lake Park. They are being exhibited at Terrace Gallery in downtown Orlando from March 17 - June 1, 2008. The Cracker Farm painting was also published in Orlando Magazine's March 2008 edition.