Forest Calligraphy

Harold Emerson Keeler

Keeler presents an abstracted landscape whose elements resemble a tangle of calligraphic forms, incongruous on close inspection but weaving their way into an untamed wilderness as the viewer steps back.

This image represents a transformational time for Keeler, who began his career in graphic design and developed a stylized modernist sensibility that focused on landscapes, architecture, and scenes of historic industry. By the late 1940s, he had relocated to Seattle and the influence of non-representational artists piqued his interest. Here, he has begun to pick apart the still, determinate lines of what he was used to and, in focusing on the energy of the subject instead, has given them new life.