Slea Head is a painting that I started long ago in 2001, after a three week painting trip to Dingle, on the west coast of Ireland. Slea Head is one of the many headlands in that rocky coast. A patchwork of sloping sheep meadows juts out above the Atlantic Ocean and ends in a steep cliff. I went to Slea Head on a day of cold mist and drizzle, bundled in warm fleece, sturdy raincoat and rain-pants. I drew with my sketch book protected inside a large clear plastic bag. When I returned to Ithaca, I started the painting in my studio. It remained hanging there, unfinished, because I thought it was lacking something. Two decades later, I could finally see – it needed less, not more, and I removed a strip of land, essentially bringing the viewer closer to the brink of the cliff, to look down on the beach below.