A vendor works on a Christmas star lantern, locally known as parol, at a street market in Quezon City, Metro Manila, Philippines on November 29, 2023. (Photo by Eloisa Lopez/Reuters)

The Rockettes perform at the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree lighting ceremony in New York, US on November 30, 2021. (Photo by Ralph Bavaro/NBC/NBCU Photo Bank via Getty Images)

A diver dressed in a Santa Claus costume swims with a penguin at Sunshine Aquarium during preparations for the upcoming Christmas special event in Tokyo on December 1, 2025. (Photo by Kazuhiro Nogi/AFP via Getty Images)

Young women pose for photos in a Christmas-themed tunnel lit-up with decorations outside a shopping mall in Bangkok on December 4, 2020. (Photo by Mladen Antonov/AFP Photo)

A woman photographs a Norwegian spruce Christmas tree from Oslo after it was lit at Trafalgar Square in central London, December 4, 2014. (Photo by Toby Melville/Reuters)

Liu Yi, Chinese painter, was born in Shanghai in 1958. He was a Fine Arts graduate from the Hua Dong University for Education. He did his postgraduate study of watercolor painting at the China College of Fine Arts. He lectures at university for painting and design. He is a member of the Chinese Artists Association and is also a member of the Watercolor Painting Artists Association. He is the retired Deputy President of the Shanghai Watercolor Painting Society, and is currently the Deputy Principal of the Shanghai Arts and Technical College. He is a very accomplished watercolor painter in China.

Melanie Baier from the village Obergurig wearing a traditional Lusatian sorbian folk dress, paints an Easter egg in traditional Sorbian motives at the annual Easter egg market on March 24, 2012 in Schleife, near Hoyerswerda, Germany. Easter egg painting is a strong part of Sorbian tradition and visual elements within the painting are meant to ward off evil. (Photo by Carsten Koall/Getty Images)

Light is the sole reason why life exists. It provides us with warmth; it allows us to see; it nourishes all the living things on this planet. Many painters, especially the masters of Old Renaissance Period, have recognized the importance of light and its intimate connection with nature and life itself. In their paintings they gave tribute to light, giving the impression that their paintings had a light source hidden within them. Al Hogue, the artist who created the paintings that you see before you, has studied their techniques for many years. As time went by, light permeated not only his paintings by also his life, becoming his sole philosophy.