Luminous paintings of Dr. J. Barry Hanshaw on view in Westborough

As a budding teenage artist, J. Barry Hanshaw sketched portraits of Winston Churchill and President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Sixty years and a prestigious medical career later, Dr. Hanshaw paints luminous landscapes that seem to glow with an inner radiance.

Whether painting a mother and child in a Tokyo park or sunlight dancing across a field of snow at Tower Hill, he imbues his scenes with what poet William Wordsworth called "the freshness of a dream."

A retired pediatrician and dean emeritus of the University of Massachusetts Medical School, Hanshaw attributes his paintings' signature brilliance to the intuitive marriage of technique and passion.

"I like to see pictures that pop," he said.

The Boylston resident is exhibiting 14 oil paintings in a lovely show at the Westboro Gallery simply titled "Barry Hanshaw: Recent Work."

Running through Jan. 8, the show features mid-sized oil paintings of landscapes and coastal scenes from Rockport and Sante Fe, New Mexico, to Ogunquit, Maine, and Banff National Park in the Canadian Rockies.

They range in size from 8 by 10 inches to 16 by 20 inches. While Hanshaw has previously painted 24-by-30-inch scenes, it would be exciting to see him work on a really monumental scale.

It is no exaggeration to say Hanshaw -- at his considerable best -- enflames his landscapes and natural scenes with the incandescent palette of English giant J.M.W. Turner.

Like a child who catches fireflies in a jar, he seems to have journeyed across the U.S. in search of sun-dazzled scenes to paint.

The rising sun bathes a rocky Southwestern canyon in golden light that contrasts against the shadowy mountains in Hanshaw's favorite, "Morning in Indian Country."

In his stunningly beautiful "Dawn," a solitary figure carrying a walking stick or maybe a fishing pole strolls along a beach in the first blushing light of morning.

The convergence of a vast, variegated sky and swelling ocean is so primordial that Hanshaw's "Rockport" might have been painted on the first day of creation.

Hanshaw said he uses a paint knife to mix and layer his colors, often giving his landscapes and coastal scenes a sense of depth.

Growing up in Scarsdale, N.Y., Hanshaw said he felt drawn to medicine as a teenager though his stockbroker father wanted him to study business. Accepted at the age of 19 to enter Syracuse University's pre-med program, he only painted intermittently over the ensuing decades.

"I painted a picture every 15 or 20 years," he said, somewhat ruefully. "I sold two watercolors for $25 each."

Married since medical school, Hanshaw and his wife Chris, who teaches piano at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, raised five children and traveled around the world as his busy work schedule allowed.

After graduation, Hanshaw served as a doctor with the U.S. Air Force while stationed in Japan.

At the encouragement of his wife, Hanshaw revived his long-dormant interest in art while serving as dean of UMass Medical School by taking painting courses at the Worcester Art Museum from 1988 to 2010. He credited instructors William Griffiths and Ella Delyanis for emphasizing composition, lighting and color theory. After focusing on pastels for many years, he switched to oil paints in the mid-1990s because he felt the chalky pastels might have been affecting his health.

Hanshaw estimated he's shown his paintings in about 20 exhibits and been invited to show his work in several prestigious exhibits, including the ARTS Worcester 2009 Biennial and the Tower Hill Botanic Garden's juried show.

He recently published "The Art of J. Barry Hanshaw," a handsome book with 40 favorite works interspersed with his reflections on how he created certain effects.

A frequent traveler, Hanshaw said he has no qualms about photographing scenes he plans to paint, especially since New England's fickle weather makes working outside difficult.

"A photo lets me know where the light and dark is. I was never impressed with the idea you have to work on site. After all, Vermeer used a camera," he said.

Now 82, Hanshaw has the freedom to devote himself nearly full time to his painting.

ArtScope magazine wrote, "Hanshaw's work wouldn't be out of place in a museum setting." His former teacher, Griffiths, praised his work, saying, "The paintings of Barry Hanshaw keep getting better. His sense of color and light makes one feel as if you are inside the painting with no compromise of his wonderful brush technique."