Artist Statement

How the Land Changed the Way I Paint

More than thirty-five years ago, I moved from New York City to Florida. I fell in love with Florida’s wetlands — not just as places to paint, but as ecosystems worth fighting for. That love has quietly shaped every choice I make in the studio.

When I first started painting these landscapes, I was drawn to their beauty in a fairly straightforward way — I did “scenes viewed through the window:” beautiful, shimmering water surrounded by sawgrass and cabbage palms. But the longer I’ve worked to preserve these places, the more intentional my artistic choices have become.

My subject matter narrowed as my commitment deepened. I paint what I know, and I know these wetlands the way you know something you’ve spent decades trying to protect. Every marsh, every cypress knee has a history that I carry with me into the studio.

My palette has evolved too. Florida’s wetland light is particular — humid, diffuse, sometimes electric before a storm. I’ve moved toward colors that honor that atmosphere rather than romanticize it. The murky greens and tarnished golds of a wetland aren’t conventionally pretty, but they’re honest, and they have their own unique beauty.

And then there are the stormy skies. Florida storms are dramatic and humbling. Painting them feels like an act of witness — a reminder that these landscapes are powerful and alive, not just scenic backdrops. My painted skies are turbulent and unresolved. Often there is very little visible ground, which is symbolic of “nowhere to stand, no ground beneath our feet.”  These places are not tame. And they shouldn’t look tame.

After 35 years, I can’t separate the artist from the advocate. The wetlands shaped me, and I hope my paintings, in some small way, make others want to protect them too.

Joan Altabe, Art Critic for the Sarasota Herald Tribune, 1997

“The words “Landscape Painting” is often used as a common-place term, wasted on work of little distinction.  Leslie Neumann’s visions of natural scenery are the real thing.   There’s no peace here, no safe hold. Neumann’s landscapes are about life.  They celebrate unpredictability and mood. If you want to see the sublime, if you want to see what Florida would be missing without its wetlands, see these pictures by Neumann.”