Lincoln Commission

This is a recent commission for the Brain family. With all the political discussions going on here in the United States and even abroad in the UK, it was a breath of fresh air to spend some time with old Abraham Lincoln. It was fun to listen to some audiobooks about his life as I painted this piece. As we have faced trials recently, may we take his advice from another time when the country was on the verge of bursting apart:

"We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature."