Utah artist Brad Aldridge paints landscapes that seem at once generalized and specific. They may or may not refer to actual places. He eschews grandiose, dramatic landscapes and opts for intimate, quiet scenes, often of small streams, which I particularly enjoy.

Aldridge works in oil on prepared panels and prefers a muted palette with understated colors, subtle tones and an emphasis on the visual texture of his scenes. There is very often a subtle focal point of an individual shrub or tree. If you study several of his paintings, you’ll realize that his has deftly controlled the path your eye takes around his compositions.

The frames for Aldridge’s paintings are unique and seem specific to the individual paintings, as if they were considered part of the finished work and not simply a showcase for it. Alridge creates most (or all) of these frames himself.

In many cases he has created paintings on panels cut to unique shapes, often incorporating rounded or gothic arches at the top of the panel, that have corresponding frames, cut to emphasize the unusual shape of the panels.

I haven’t found a dedicated site for Aldridge, but he is represented by a few galleries who feature his work in their sites. The Joyce Robins Gallery has a good section of Aldridge’s work, as well as a nice essay on the artist by the gallery’s owner.

Bennett Galleries has a smaller selection. Leslie Levy Fine Art has 7.

Despite an awkward and inconveniently “clever” horizontally scrolling interface (in which you must hover your mouse over a link and wait for the Flash script to scroll the images at its pace, not yours), the Arcadia Gallery site still has the best selection of Aldridge’s work I have been able to find, as well as the largest images.