Reference photo of house on corner of 355 and Comus Rd.

Charcoal wash lay-in on pastelbord

It’s going to be a cold, wet week, with no chance to paint outside. But on my way home from painting on Friday, I stopped to film a favorite house that I’ve always wanted to paint. I love the way it sits up on the hill and the triangle created by the fence. What struck me this time was the lovely little locust tree surrounded by dark foliage and located just where the fences come together. The wild mustard also adds a little extra color and there is bugle in the foreground that I’ll make more of. I knew right away that this would be a 16 x 20 on Pastelbord and that I would treat it similarly to my painting On the Road to Jackson. I started with  charcoal to rough in the house, fence and foliage. I thought about leaving out the lower fence and adding it after the underpainting, but it is too critical to the composition and I wanted to get its location right. I need to change the length of some of the sections, but I’m happy with it’s positioning.

Path with Wild Mustard, 14 x 11, UART 500

I got outside again today, another lovely but cooler day. Went back to the same location where I had found a path that intrigued me. I stood in mostly shade looking up at the sunlit hill. I focused on how to simplify and enhance the shapes in the composition. The background trees, for instance, did not form this lovely shape–but who would know!  I did a small study with my tombow pens (read Richard McKinley’s latest blog–always a good reminder). My challenge was to present the mustard in both light and shadow. At the bottom, I used a number of greener and browner yellows to hopefully indicate the shadowed flowers. I liked the fact that the bottom was in shadow as it allowed me to bring down some of the color from the dark tree.  Working outside twice now makes it clear to me how both similar and different plein air painting is from studio painting. In the studio, I have time to think about the composition and the best surface and technique that I will use. Outside one has to make much faster decisions. And I only brought one type and size of surface. But both come down to good shapes, values and colors. For the last year or two I’ve favored working on a toned surface that allowed me to immediately begin with pastel. Now, I’m working on the UART with hard pastels and alcohol underpainting and I like this approach very much as it helps me loosen up and focus on the broad shapes and the rythym and flow of the darks and lights.

My painting set up with car close by!

Young pear, 14 x 11, UART 500

It was glorious out there this morning!  We have so little really perfect weather and we seem to be in for more of it, so I hope to get out again. I found this young pear tree surrounded by dark evergreens and lovely shadows at Black Hills Regional Park, near Boyds, MD. I was a little worried about the complexity of the subject matter, but found that my recent foray into abstract shapes really helped and that was what I focused on. I also paid attention to using a real mix of greens. The color here is primarily observed color, with a few licenses taken. I also decided to get over my timid use of the 500 UART. I began with a hard pastel and alcohol wash and that really helped a lot. I put in dark greens under the light area of the tree and began with green pastels, leaving the “whites” till last. They are a combination of soft light greens, a light pink and a little light yellow.  When I paint outside, I like to be close to my car, so as not to have to carry my gear too far. I bring a small box of hard pastels in my painting bag, and the right hand row of my Heilman backpack box is all Giraults. I used a lot of my new greens in the painting. FYI, I have made no changes to the painting since bringing it inside, except to sign my name. I keep seeing things I might like to tweek, but I decided to keep this as it was!

Beach Fantasy #2 (redone)

This morning when I went to the studio, I was REALLY unhappy with my second painting. The sky was dull and boring and I didn’t like the composition very much. So I decided to see what I could do with it. I began by stepping outside with a sturdy bristle brush and getting rid of the sky!  I didn’t get back to the real red of the surface, but there was enough there to give me the idea of going darker in the sky, I got out my lovely red violets and then added some grayed blue greens and a hint of light shining through, changed the color of the water and did a lot of other things!  I began by darkening the values of the grasses and the evergreens. I decided to make the trees at right be a solid shape of blue violet and used a little darker red violet in the smaller trees at the back. I got rid of the flowers on the bushes and played with color, trying to darken a bit without brushing down (always a challenge!).  This is no masterpiece (I won’t be entering it into the PSA show!), but I think it will be framed and entered with its companion in my October show at Waverly Street Gallery.  This exercise of working without any guide whatsoever is fun and a good test of one’s knowledge of color theory. But I’m ready to work from life and it’s a beautiful day and my backpack box is ready to go!