her toward fantasy and surrealism. The two sides of

her toward fantasy and surrealism.

The two sides of her work — the realistic and the surrealistic — surface in the oil paintings and drawings that go on display Nov. 3 at Washington’s Middle St. Gallery.

“House bound with two little children, I find myself staring out the window and across the fields a lot,” she confided, explaining the predominance of views from the town of Washington in her recent oils. “I could continue to paint Jenkins Mountain and Ginger Hill forever. It fascinates me — how the scene changes every day.”

The greens are lush and luminous, the depth and richness of the colors bringing a three dimensional quality to the canvas. The light is of day’s end, the twilight that bestows an otner-worldly radiance on fields and forest.

County people will recognize the radiance and remember the times they’ve slowed the car to a crawl on the drive home to marvel anew at the beauty of this place. Purnell has captured that beauty.

“Rappahannock takes on a magical quality at dusk. There’s a special glow to the light here just before dusk. It’s like nothing else I’ve ever seen,” Purnell explained.

The trees dotting the fields and the Black Angus cattle standing expectantly in the tall grass are stylized, more perfect than life. 1 "“I’m not trying to paint what the eye of the camera would catch,” Purnell noted.. Instead, she paints with the eye of an artist, an artist who sees “a magical place, an unreal place” from the windows of her rambling white house on Old 211.

Captures essence

Not all of the paintings on display at Middle St. Gallery are of Rappahannock, and the touches of fantasy and surrealism so striking in her landscapes are missing from Purnell’s still lifes.

Strawberries on a blue and white china plate are so realistic you can taste their promise of sweet sum