Late Summer Lighthouse | 12×16.5 | Oil on Linen Panel

Inspiration for Late Summer Lighthouse

I returned to the Pensacola lighthouse, perennially one of my favorite painting locations, to begin Late Summer Lighthouse. The late afternoon light was beautiful and vibrant on the two-toned tower, red roof, and surrounding live oaks. The crepe myrtles were in bloom and their little reddish flowers beautifully accented the reds in the building. Warm sunlight was bouncing off the ground and illuminating the porch in an ocher glow. Meanwhile, the long shadows lying a rich blue over both the white architecture and the crushed shells in the parking area. Looking at the painting now, it’s really a study in compliments. The verdant trees and bushes set against the brilliant reds in the house and channel marker. The orange-tinted clouds set against the gorgeous blue sky. Even the black-and-white color scheme of the tower itself lends to this theme of opposites!

Brief History of the Pensacola Lighthouse

In 1852, the newly established Lighthouse Board recommended that a “first-class seacoast light” with a height no less than 150 feet be built at Pensacola. Congress allocated $25,000 for the lighthouse in 1854, and an additional $30,000 in 1856. John Newton of the Army Corps of Engineers supervised work on the tower. Construction was completed in 1858, and Keeper Palmes first lit the lamp in the tower’s first-order Fresnel lens on New Year’s Day, 1859. The tower stands 159-feet-tall with 177 steps and was originally painted white. (It was later repainted for additional recognizability in its current black-and-white scheme.) The base of the tower has a diameter of 30 feet, tapering to a diameter of 15 feet at the top.