Nice to Meet Yew

This is my first painting in Scotland. The tree is enormous, which I showed by including the little bench in front of it and a small portion of the castle. At first, I thought it was a clump of trees, but when I walked around it, I saw a well-worn entrance through its long, shaggy branches. That’s when I saw it is one massive tree whose branches hang down like thick tentacles creating a tall and wide canopy cooler than any treehouse I’ve been in. (As I entered I said hello to a local couple, and—upon hearing my foreign accent?—they told me to look out for changelings.)

At the end of my trip I was thrilled to finally run into the gardeners (Yvonne and Christopher pictured) at Brodie, and they told me that the tree is a yew and it predates the castle. That’s more than 600 years old! Yews are known for their longevity because those hanging branches can reroot and form new trunks. AAAAND, I learned that Scotland’s--and perhaps Europe’s--oldest tree is a yew estimated to be 2,000-5,000 years old. Isn’t old stuff great?

Now, why is this painting magenta? It is a value study using only white, cadmium red, and quinacridone magenta