California impressionist wildflower painting by Karen Winters

california landscape oil painting pepper tree san gabriel mountains impressionist art

“Those Fields, Those Hills”
9 x 12 oil on hardboard plein air panel

See more of my landscapes here

Springtime in Southern California brings the awakening of wildflowers to the hillsides. Some of the dried grasses of winter remain, but the cheery California sunflowers brighten the scene. This hillside was not strewn with wild mustard, as many are, but had a profusion of small beige and white flowers, plus helianthus californicus, the California sunflower.

The large tree is a pepper tree. The foliage of its soft branches seem to drift and sway in the wind, not unlike a weeping willow.