Gavin Sorley

Gavin Sorley paints junipers, and he has good reason to. The old ones east of Bend, Oregon, where he lives, are older than many cathedrals, growing sideways, splitting, dying halfway and carrying on anyway, and he admires that stubbornness. Before he turned to painting full time, Gavin worked as a river rafting guide, years spent reading water, weather and the long, patient shapes of the high desert. He went on to earn a BA in Environmental Studies with a studio art minor from Oregon State University, a pairing that still shows in how closely he looks at a single living thing before he puts it on paper.

His medium is watercolor and graphite on rough paper, and his style leans minimal: usually one juniper per painting, because, as he puts it, two start arguing. In fog, a tree becomes a gray smudge with an opinion, and Gavin lets the wash, the grain of the paper and plenty of open space do the talking. The resulting canvases bring a quiet, weathered calm to bedrooms, reading corners, home offices and entryways, and they sit especially well in rooms with natural wood, linen and soft neutral walls. Below are Sorley’s canvases in our shop, ready to hang.