The paintings of Zach Storm strike a balance between carefully considered compositions, natural phenomena and the artist’s own studious dive into the alchemy of process-driven painting techniques. Starting with thin washes of poured and lightly-sanded water-based paint on aluminum panels, luminescent compositions establish a foreground, horizon line and sky- elements that become the staging for a central event. Storm then spends a great deal of time setting up his palette by meticulously mixing oil paint into a viscous medium. Loading brushes with multiple colors, Storm takes a somewhat meditative Sumi-e approach, while building the central compositions with painterly brushstrokes that vary in velocity, landing on the surface through equal parts orchestration and improvisation. Landscapes evolve and take form pulling the viewer in. There are hints at vegetation and rock formations, while Storm purposely avoids and denotes anything that might represent civilization. The composition’s orientation places the viewer at the entry point to the paintings and as a witness to an emotive singular event that floats between the possibility of being an optical mirage, hallucination, or perhaps a supernatural occurrence, that is both otherworldly and located within the material physicality of the paint itself. Like a final testimony to the physical importance of Storm's paintings, upon completion and using reclaimed walnut, the artist builds custom wood frames for each work, perhaps in an effort to reorient the paintings in the natural world, a reconciliation we all must face.