In Wendigo Pond, High Park, Steven Henderson offers an intimate, immersive view into a shaded woodland interior, where tree trunks rise like vertical sentinels around a quiet pool of water. The composition is tightly framed, drawing the viewer into the forest rather than across it, with reflections and dappled light becoming as important as the solid forms of the trees themselves.

The pond sits at the centre, its surface broken by soft, painterly reflections of trunks and foliage, rendered in muted blues, greys, and olive greens. Henderson’s brushwork is confident and expressive: strokes remain visible, allowing colour and movement to suggest water, leaves, and filtered sunlight rather than describing them literally. Bright touches of fresh green undergrowth punctuate the darker passages, giving a sense of late spring or early summer growth thriving in the cool shade.

The vertical rhythm of the trees contrasts with the horizontal stillness of the water, creating a quiet tension that holds the scene together. There is no human presence, only the sense of a secluded urban wilderness momentarily removed from the city beyond. Henderson captures the contemplative, almost hushed atmosphere of High Park’s interior spaces, where light, reflection, and structure merge into a richly observed, painterly meditation on place.