Breath

Dark trunks rise through pale mist, but their edges do not remain equally fixed. The nearest trees are dark and sharply defined; farther back, trunks become lighter and thinner until they almost disappear into the upper field. Depth develops through this gradual loss of contrast rather than through a visible horizon, while the repeated verticals keep the woodland structurally clear.

In the original watercolour, transparent washes leave areas of the paper close to white within the fog, while denser pigment gathers in the foreground trunks and lower canopy. Fine branches retain a linear character, but the crowns soften into irregular stains and blurred edges. The shift from line to wash follows the recession of the forest, so atmosphere and spatial depth are carried by the same changes in the watercolour.