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Finding the Light in Plein Air Painting

Oil painting of th early fall colors reflected in Beaver Lake, Oak Mountain State Park, Alabama

When I go outside to paint, I am looking for the light and I am anticipating where it will be in 2 hours when I will be finishing the painting. I say I am looking for it, but truthfully, it catches my eye.  The more I paint, the more the light catches my eye.  The drive home from Birmingham, Alabama, yesterday was heaven, the light was so brilliant.  It was a crisp, clear fall day, with long shadows and the clarity of lower humidity. Autumn colors were just beginning to show. It’s interesting that the drive up to Birmingham was so much less remarkable, simply because it was a gray day, a 3 on my scale of days worth painting.  But yesterday was a 10!  Part of the visual ecstasy was due to having been painting in the morning.  Anytime I paint plein air, my awareness and my enjoyment of all things visual increases exponentially.

The morning broke gently in Oak Mountain State Park, slight pinks in the mist over the Beaver Lake, glowing through the filter of the screen roof of my tent. There had been almost no chance of rain, so I had slept there without a rainfly.  I left my cozy lightweight sleeping bag and walked down to the water’s edge, but my morning meditation was cut short by the realization that the trees were going to be sparkling bright in a few minutes, and the lake would provide glassy reflections. I went back to the campsite and set up to paint. My campmate, Leslie, took her oil pastels some 100 yards away to a picnic table, and I was left to watch the light evolve.

I had to resist the temptation to paint the myriad detail. My intention was to capture the color of the trees on the far side of the lake, and the reflections. I could not indulge in the amazing purples in the foreground tree leaves, or the oranges in the dewy grass — they had to remain muted in order to stay true to what had caught my eye in the beginning. That is the discipline required when plein air painting, because “eye-candy” is everywhere.

Oil pastel painting of early fall colors on the mountain behind Beaver lake at Oak Mountain State Park, by Leslie Kolovich
Leslie Kolovich, Beaver Lake, Study in Oil Pastels

I’ve been helping my friend Leslie Kolovich with technique and media exploration and lately she has been plein air painting.  I have been thrilled with her progress every step of the way.  I didn’t consider her piece finished finished yesterday — we needed to pack up and get back home for her family obligations, but I was very happy with where her piece was going.  We talked about her continuing to layer color and continuing developing the darks, and how to add reflection in the lake water.  I was blown away later last night when she texted me, declaring her painting “Horrible” and “Embarrassingly bad”. I think this is a perfect example of a point that many artists get to, at a certain stage of each work, when they wonder what on earth ever made them think they could be an artist.  At that point, you either quit the piece, or you continue trudging through the process. It’s not a happy time. I remember reading that it took Leonardo daVinci 4 years to paint the Mona Lisa.  The problem is that we are so impatient, we expect instant success.  And Leslie has had instant success on many of her works.  She has amazing talent. But there always is that period of time in creating art when the work looks completely wrong and unsalvageable. It’s the point when you have “Broken the egg in order to make the omelet”. I think that’s what Leslie was seeing last night. But at the same time, I am not a fan of working on a piece that is making me miserable.  So I told her she had a decision to make.  She could continue to work on it, she could scrub the board clean and re-use it, or she could set the painting aside and let it be for a while. I hope she doesn’t kill me for posting her work here.

Oil painting of the deer moss and lichen on a birdhouse in the treesA couple weeks ago I was late getting to my weekly plein air group outing, and nothing immediately appealed to me, knowing I would only have about an hour or so to paint before it would be time to meet and critique, so I went back home and wandered my yard for inspiration. I returned to a birdhouse that had caught my eye a few weeks before, the deer moss and lichen on the roof providing such a great contrast of texture to the aging wood. I am deciding whether I should add a bird back in the bushes, to give it more story.

 

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Plein Air Painting on a Road Trip

Last Friday I drove a friend, Leslie, up to Birmingham for her doctor appointment, on the condition that I could paint before we left the next day.  To my pleasant surprise, she wanted to try painting too!

I had brought my usual plein air backpack and paints, but in my vehicle I also keep a Guerrilla Painter kit, which is a small box containing oil paints, palette, brushes, and everything else needed for spur-of-the-moment painting, for times when something just has to be painted but catches me without my full backpack.  So I set Leslie up with that kit.  I toned our canvases a light orange, and while they dried, I laid out Leslie’s palette, with a good dollop of each of the primary colors, plus another hue of blue, and also white.  A little linseed oil and some solvent completed the set-up. We were at Oak Mountain State Park, and we picked a view of the lake with a sweet cove in the foreground, lush greens everywhere.  I stopped painting every 20 minutes or so to reassure Leslie who seemed ready to throw away her efforts every time I turned around. She stayed with it until to her surprise, she finished her first plein air oil painting!  I always find myself a little surprised too, at the end of nearly every plein air session, to have a finished painting, or very nearly finished, after 60, 90, or 120 minutes of such struggle, such searching for the right colors and strokes to express the truth that I see.

And afterwards, as we were driving back home, we found ourselves in that frame of mind that comes only after that intense focus, that blissful sense of the present moment, when nothing exists except the immediate which becomes intensely magnified by its undistracted singularity.  The scenery we were driving through was more beautiful.  The rolling hills and green roadsides were in high definition and “Technicolor”.  It was what I now recognize as that ecstatic state of awareness brought on by plein air painting, similar to meditation or any other pastime requiring sincere concentration.

Below is my finished painting from this adventure at Oak Mountain State Park, and another from Boggy Bayou State Park in Niceville, FL, where I met up with the Emerald Coast Plein Air Painters 2 weeks ago.

Oil painting of the lake at Oak Mountain State Park, Birmingham, AL

Oil painting of the trees and cast shadows at Fred Gannon Boggy Bayou State Park, Niceville, FL

 

But sometimes a painting is not finished, usually due to the light changing, or bugs biting, or weather threatening. Below are 3 unfinished studies, one of the spring at Ponce de Leon State Park, FL, one of a cedar at Camp Helen State Park, and one of the multi-colored leaves of some potted plants in front of the gazebo at Grayt Grounds of Monet Monet.

Ponce de Leon, study Cedar at Camp Helen, study Grayt Grounds, study

As always, most of my paintings and images are available for purchase.  Contact me if you are interested. — Joan Vienot

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Completion of Plein Air Paintings in the Studio

Oil painting of Gascoigne Bay looking through the trees and brush

I’ve heard of certain art described as being painted “in the style of plein air”, but that description describes nothing, because plein air is not a style.  Some plein air artists paint in a more abstracted style, and some paint very representationally. Plein air painting, by definition, is painting in open air, on-site. It describes an activity as well as the painting produced during that activity. Plein air artists focus on capturing some aspect of the actual fleeting light. Usually the subject and the artist are at the mercy of the elements and the environment, but there are no rules — if the weather or bugs are nasty, the artist might paint from inside his car.  But very little, if any work, is done in the studio. When invitations are given for plein air works to be formally shown, usually the requirement is that most of the painting have been done outdoors, on site, from life, anywhere from 80% of the painting painting en plein air, to the purist’s position of 100% painted on site.

As for my plein work, occasionally I will correct a shape or add a detail in the studio, but usually my plein air paintings are fully completed outdoors, on site. Like many plein air artists, I have many plein air paintings stacked in my studio that for one reason or another, I consider unfinished, or with which I feel less than satisfied as far as the painting representing my impression of the scene and setting.  Some have compositional problems, because in addition to the value patterns showing the play of light, there are so many design elements to consider – line, shape, size, position, color, texture, and density, as well as the compositional principles of balance, rhythm, and harmony.

So this week when I was chased back indoors by some biting yellow flies, I worked in the studio, making a few corrections to a plein air painting I had produced in a Laurel Daniel workshop this spring. I removed a pesky, distracting “V”, made the greens more yellow and less green, and I added a little more light in the background, and a red boat shape.  The composition is more effective now, and more clearly represents my impression of the morning view, except for the boat of course, which simply adds interest.

2014-0425 Muted Perspective, Unfinished
As initially painted en plein air, the view from Gascoigne Bluff, St. Simons Island, Georgia
Oil painting of Gascoigne Bay looking through the trees and brush
Completed painting of the view from Gascoigne Bluff, St. Simons Island, Georgia

 

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Commissioned Works En Plein Air

I recently completed two commissioned assignments in which specific subjects were requested.  In the first case, a specific style also was requested.  Fortunately for me, the stylistic samples I was given, ranged from the light and airy scenes of the French Impressionists to a piece of “outsider art” which had that sort of purely expressive sense of being painted by an artist who has not had formal training.  I was confident I could paint within that wide of a range!

The location of the first commissioned piece was in the gardens at Grayt Grounds of Monet Monet, at a wedding reception, and my job was to paint the bride and groom’s first dance.  When I arrived to get the background started, the Forrest Williams band was setting up, and the people from Grayton Beach Catering were bustling about.  My background was blocked in when the first guests arrived, and I was enjoying the band singing “She’s as Sweet as Tupelo Honey”.  By the time the guests started arriving, my 10×8 painting was well underway, and a few of the guests would wander over and watch as I worked.  I let one of the children put some color on the bottom part.  When the bride and groom were announced and made their entrance onto the dance floor, I put down my brush and picked up my sketchpad and my camera.  After the dance, I laid in the figures on my nearly finished background and then finished the details in the studio using my sketch and my photos for reference.  Afterwards, I decided to paint another painting in the studio, making effort to paint in a more “Impressionist” style, with layers of short, patterned brushstrokes loaded with color, which was great fun.  (See also my later blog “Commissions under Pressure – Plein Air at Events”.)

Sketch of couple dancing outdoors Plein air sketch Oil Painting of Couple Dancing Outdoors by Bridge, Painted en Plein Air Plein air painting, details in studio Oil Painting of Couple Dancing Outdoors by Bridge, Impressionist Style Studio painting

 

The second commission was for Channing Gardner, a real estate agent, for a gift for his client.  My task was to paint the Seagrove Beach property as it was when it was purchased, before anything was built on it.  It took me two mornings to complete it, because of the changing light and the heat.  I opted for a wider format, painting it 12×24, which allowed me to include more of the coastal development to contrast with the empty lot.

Oil painting of central Seagrove Beach westward towards Seaside, showing recently purchased empty lot

June is my busiest time of year in my day job, managing my pool service business, so I was not able to join the local plein air painters yet this summer until things lightened up this week.  We met near the pond at Mystic Port, a small collection of shops and restaurants north of Grayton Beach, Florida.  I was intrigued by the fountain, but never having painted one, I gladly accepted the suggestion of a more experienced artist, to put the splash on the surface of the water and then take a palette knife and drag upwards.  I am happy with the results — I can hearing the water falling.  Other works by our group on that day can be found on our Emerald Coast Plein Air Painters Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.520412828081717.1073741866.285985251524477&type=1.

Oil painting of the fountain splashing at Mystic Port, Grayton Beach, FL

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Plein Air with Laurel Daniel – Blocking In

2014-0424 St. Andrews Beach, Jekyll Island
St. Andrews Beach, Jekyll Island

2014-0425 Muted Perspective, Unfinished
Gascoigne Bluff, St. Simons Island, unfinished

2014-0425 Slave Cabins, St. Simons Island
Restored Slave Houses, St. Simons Island, incomplete (Some heavy energy remaining here)

2014-0425 Sunrise Over the Marsh
Nupastel drawing of my marsh view at sunrise

2014-0426 Sea Island Marsh 1
Sea Island Marsh 1

2014-0426 Sea Island Marsh 2
Sea Island Marsh 2, incomplete

Coastal Georgia was a beautiful place to be, last week.  I drove from my home in Northwest Florida to St. Simons Island for a plein air painting working with Laurel Daniel, a fabulous artist whose work I have been watching for years, following her blog even before I ever decided to try plein air painting.  Laurel is a master at ‘definitive suggestion’ in her work, leaving out just enough of the smaller details which invites the viewer to participate.  I am a fan of this kind of work, because the longer the viewer will look at the piece, the more they will appreciate it, and not just see it and walk away.

Photo by Laurel Daniel
Joan Vienot at work (Photo by Laurel Daniel)

DSC04294
Photos of the marsh outside my hotel
DSC04278
DSC04274

Laurel worked hard for us, teaching us to show distance by muting intensity and tapering values to mid-range, but her primary focus was teaching us to block-in the basic shapes and values before getting down to the business of painting.  Each day she demo’d a different way of blocking-in, before painting luscious scenes “From Marsh to Seaside.”  Her three block-in methods include dry brush sketch in a dark neutral; mid-toning with a neutral and then wiping out lighter values and adding darks; and the most difficult, blocking in with true colors at correct value.  Laurel put the dark elements in the painting first, leaving the lighter values for later.   Her reasoning was to get down the shadow patterns first, so that we would be able to hold onto them throughout the painting, because the light and shadows change throughout the two hours you are painting.  In this location, the tide changed as well.  A marsh full of water might be nearly bone dry by the time you were finishing a painting, so what started out to be a pattern of light on water, could be dark mudflats by the time you finished.  Laurel blogged about her workshop at http://www.laureldaniel.blogspot.com/2014/05/marshside-palms-demo-georgia-workshop.html. We were treated to an opening of Laurel’s works at Anderson Fine Art Gallery on St. Simons Island on Friday evening, midway through the workshop.  There were a lot of red dots on the labels by the end of the evening, indicating “SOLD”.  I would have loved to have brought one home with me, but it already had a red dot on it, sold before I arrived.  I was happy to see works by other amazing artists in the other rooms of the gallery, including Morgan Samuel Price from whom I took a workshop in April. On the last day of the workshop, my muted phone started buzzing while I was shooting some progress photos of the instructor’s demo — it was Joe Taylor calling, the organizer of the Forgotten Coast en Plein Air.  I will be attending a workshop by Ken Dewaard and Greg LaRock after that event, so I thought it might be some details about that.  But no.  Joe started by asking me if I had received his email, and I drew a blank.  I went from confusion to shock, when he said he had emailed me to ask if I would like to be one of the students in a pilot workshop that is being designed as Advanced Plein Air for the Apalachicola School of Art.  I managed to compose myself enough to say Yes!  So I will be taking 2 workshops, back-to-back, next week.  When I set the intention of taking as many plein air workshops as I could afford this year, I didn’t know that I would be getting more workshops than I can afford!  (This one will be free!) I am delayed in getting this blog posted.  We had a flooding rainstorm that shut down the entire Florida Panhandle, closing roads and bringing everything to a standstill.  About 2 feet of rain fell in a 24-hour period.  I was fortunate that my home and business did not suffer any damages, other than a sign blown down.  Many others are not so fortunate.  The same storm spawned killer tornados in other states.  Nevertheless, it kept me from getting back into the studio to practice my new awareness gained from Lasurel Daniel’s workshop. Here’s a quick video of the bridge over the slow moving swamp I cross every day, a half-mile from my home. http://youtu.be/3cGH-p9XM00

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Plein Air in Fresh Air

Oil painting of the four trees in front of Nick's Restaurant at Basin Bayou, Florida - www.joanvienot.com
Oil painting of the old fishing boat, Pompano, at Nick's Restaurant - www.joanienot.com

After a month of high pollen alerts, torrential rains have cleaned the air and a very chilly air mass ushered in an ideal day for plein air painting, with stark shadows and bright colors.  I met up with the Emerald Coast Plein Air Painters at Nick’s Restaurant in Basin Bayou, which is on the north side of the Choctawhatchee Bay, halfway between Freeport and Niceville, in Northwest Florida.  Shortly after we arrived, the neighbor released his penful of exotic chickens, and they provided distraction and amusement while we painted, the young roosters strutting around, trying their first crowing in cracking, adolescent voices.

I remembered what I had learned in Morgan Samuel Price’s workshop  2 weeks ago.  I worked with the intention of creating the illusion of space, with horizontal surfaces catching much more light and vertical surfaces much less, using values to lead the eye through the painting.

For my first painting, I was interested by the four trees along the shoreline, so I opted not to include the boat, “Pompano”, which stood on dry-land props between two of the trees.  My interest was that one of the trees was as orange as it was green.  After I finished it, I painted a second, smaller painting, this one of the boat.  Both paintings accomplished what I set out to do.

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Studying from Morgan Samuel Price

Oil painting on canvas panel

2014-0323 Apalach Afternoon Behind the Island
The view from where I stayed

2014-0324 Coombs Inn
Coombs Inn and the Church

2014-0325 Scrub Oak Grove
Scrub Oak Grove, St. George Island

2014-0326 Apalachicola Marina
At the Marina Under the Bridge

2014-0327 Scipio Creek
Scipio Creek

2014-0328 Rainy Day at 'Up the Creek'
“N 2 Deep”

Last week I attended a plein air painting workshop in Apalachicola, Florida, taught by Morgan Samuel Price. The location of this fishing village is just two hours from my home, an easy drive but far enough away that I chose to stay in a rental property rather than commute. I learned so much I hardly know where to begin.  It will probably take me years to assimilate it. The difficult thing about an intense learning situation, is that much of it is communicated abstractly in words and absorbed into the left brain, while painting is performed on the right side of the brain. Fortunately, Morgan demonstrated during and after each lecture, to help us make right-brain sense of the concepts she was teaching. And she didn’t seem to mind repeating answers while each of us gained just enough understanding to ask the same question the previous student had just asked. “Morgan, what colors are you using now?” “Ultramarine blue, cadmium red light, and hansa yellow,” Morgan would answer. And the next student would ask, “Morgan, what colors did you mix to get this color?” And Morgan would patiently answer, “Ultramarine blue, cadmium red light, and hansa yellow.” To be fair, though, the different colors we were asking about were entirely different colors — it’s just that Morgan is a wizard at color mixing, and can make any color on the palette out of ultramarine blue, cadmium red light, and hansa yellow.

The first day, Morgan taught us about various materials and how to hold the brush for different angles of brushstrokes, and she taught us about color value, intensity, and temperature. She taught us more about those topicss every single day. She also taught us about  color in context, about composition, about creating the illusion of receding space, how light falls on horizontal surfaces vs vertical surfaces, how the eye moves through a painting, and even how to doodle on a scratchpad that sits by the telephone. She taught us about clarity of value and precision of shape. She taught with ease and good humor.  And she patiently answered again, “Ultramarine blue, cadmium red light, and hansa yellow.”

We had some good sunshine the weekend before the class, but our only sunny day during the class was the first day, Monday. After watching Morgan paint a simple alleyway with so many luscious values and such obvious perspective, making it look oh-so-easy, she turned us loose to paint in the afternoon. I choose the bright yellow siding of the Inn where everyone else was staying, and tried to capture the perspective of the sidewalk receding toward the church in the background. Even in my frustration (left brain / right brain confusion), I already had begun to learn. It is in the struggle that I find I truly learn, whether the painting shows that learning or not.  There is some confusion between the palm tree and the porch roof which makes the porch roof look like it is angled wrong — it’s not.  But as we joked in class, sometimes we need arrows and words printed on our painting to explain different elements.  My painting of the Inn could use several arrows.

The next day we drove to St. George Island, and I painted a grove of scrub oaks which had a play of light on the tree trunks that interested me.  I struggled with that light, but Morgan said to be definite with it — so I put down my tentative little brush and made some bold swaths of light, giving it much more of the feel that I wanted.

On Wednesday, two of the other students and I got lost from the rest of the class.  We painted near the base of the bridge to SGI, at a marina.  I painted on 16×20 canvas panel instead of my usual 8×10. I enjoyed using bigger brushes, but found myself being very stingy in mixing my colors, never mixing enough paint.  It’s difficult to paint with no paint on your brush.

Thursday found us at Scipio Creek, at another marina at the north edge of Apalachicola.  The pelicans and seagulls put on a continuous show for us while we caught the hazy pinks and lavenders in the middle ground and the muted grays in the distance, in contrast with the richer colors and more contrasting values in the foreground.

And then, sadly, it was Friday.  I painted beneath the overhanging deck of ‘Up the Creek’ Restaurant, with a vicious thunderstorm popping lightning all around me.  Nearby strikes three times chased me back further underneath to the center of the marine storage area under the building, which I imagined was safer.  All of the colors of my scene were washed out, at times it being so dark there was no color at all.  The last thing I painted were the reedy grasses and trees in the background, when suddenly I realized it was time to critique, so I packed up and hurried back.  I will dim the intensity of color on that foliage to make it recede more — it’s a little too bright, like the sun is shining on it, which it wasn’t.

A plug for my excellent host, the owner of the property where I stayed, Robert Lindsley:  Visit the Robert Lindsley Studio and Gallery at 15 Avenue E near the waterfront in Apalachicola.  And to the VRBO agent, my new friend Mike Klema — just search “VRBO Apalachicola” for Vacation Rentals By Owner, and Mike’s units will come up.  He was very accommodating, and I loved my place behind the island, right on US 98!  I had the thrill of seeing both the sunrises and the sunsets, as well as the parade of fishing boats every morning, and the abundant species of birds.  I’ve posted below a few photographs of my week, which all in all I enjoyed very much.

Sunrise
Sunrise

Sunset
Sunset

Low tide
Low tide

Atmospheric scenery
Atmospheric scenery

Fishing boat
Fishing boat

Eagle below my house
Eagle below my house

Demo in the alley
Demo in the alley

Class and demo on the beach
Class and demo on the beach

Morgan critiquing
Morgan critiquing

iPhonography Bicycle
iPhonography Bicycle

iPhonography Grasses
iPhonography Grasses
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Plein Air Painting – Practice Pays Off

Oil painting of the mansion at Eden Gardens State Park, behind the reflecting pool and a huge live oak treeLast weekend I painted a community street scene in the studio, using photo references, after attempting it plein air.  The architecture was filled with straight lines, which are a torture for a freehand painter.  I can fudge and fake the branches in a bush, but architectural lines for the most part look right only when placed nearly exactly where they in fact are.  So the painting of the street scene was a serious challenge for me.

But the practice served me well when I painted today, making the straight lines of today’s structure seem like child’s play by comparison.  I was in fact surprised at how quickly I was able to make an effective representation of this mansion at Eden Gardens State Park where the plein air painters met this morning.

The light was peaking in and out of the clouds, and when it peaked out, the building and middle ground lit up with vibrant color and the huge oak in the foreground became a stark silhouette.

Next week I travel to Colorado to visit family and to play in the snow in the mountains.  I will take my  camera and some paints with me.

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Painting Plein Air with an Extra-Long Filbert Brush

Extra long filbert
Extra-long Filbert
2013-1204 Dune Walkover
2013-1204 Dune Grasses
2013-1204 Bright Light on the Gulf

This blog post could be subtitled, “Where did November go?”

Soon after my show, “The Present Moment”, opened at Grayt Grounds of Monet Monet, I received an email asking if I would paint, plein air style, a view from the balcony, for some second-homeowners to hang in their “first” home in Tennessee.  I met with them, to visit and to look at their view of the coastal dune lake, Redfish Lake, and the Gulf of Mexico.  They gave me a few favorite photos, with morning light.  A day later, they sent me a photo of wind-driven clouds that they liked, and I started to work on the 24×36 gallery-wrapped canvas, with a 16×20 practice piece on the side.  The day before, I had painted with the local plein air group under the very clouds my clients had photographed.  So the scene was familiar enough to me that I was able to work from the photos and still have the feeling of being there.  I have nearly finished it and have posted photos below showing both the practice piece and the actual larger commissioned piece.  I have a few tweaks yet to do, especially perhaps darkening the tile roof on the gazebo.

Yesterday our plein air group met at Henderson Beach State Park, in Destin, Florida.  I painted with an extra-long filbert, size 7, made by Winsor & Newton.  The filbert, which I have sketched at left, is about 1/2″ wide, but the bristles are 2″ long.  I had bought it about 6 months ago, just to try out, but had never used it.  Last weekend I watched a painting demonstration on DVD by Frank Serrano.  I was inspired to try painting an entire painting using only one brush, and I thought, why not the extra-long filbert!.  So when our plein air group met at Henderson Beach State Park, in Destin, Florida, this week, I chose a scene which could easily be simplified, so that learning the brush would be my only challenge.  I grew to like the brush as I painted with it.  The extra long filbert holds more paint than an ordinary brush.  Because the bristles are longer and thus not as stiff,  it required me to lay color onto the canvas instead of scrubbing it as I sometimes do with stiffer brushes.  It was perfect for the texture of the fall-colored grasses on the dunes.

The day was gray, without direct sunlight, and the mist during the drive had dried up by the time I had set up my easel on the boardwalk to the Gulf.  A light breeze cooled it to a balmy 72°.  I painted fairly quickly, the scene complicated only by the structure of the dune walkover.  I had to use a small rigger to paint the walkover, but I used the extra-long filbert everywhere else.  The values and colors were muted by the indistinct light.  Because I had arrived about 40 minutes late, I worried that I would run out of time.  But I felt the 8×10 painting was finished after only about an hour, so I tried another, smaller one, 6×6, and wrapped it up fairly quickly too.  I started a third painting, 8×10, and gave myself the challenge of looking directly at the highlighted Gulf, sparkling white where the sun was peeking out of the darkening sky.  It turned out quite a bit more dramatic than the first two, because of the heightened values.  At right are the three paintings.  Silver plein air frames show them off nicely.  I have priced them for sale but may keep all three for my own collection.

If anyone did not get a chance to see “The Present Moment”, many of the pieces will remain at Grayt Grounds of Monet Monet, and some will be lining the stairwell on the way up to Bob and Cheri Peebles’ real estate offices on the second floor of the building, at Beach To Bay Realty.

Below is the not-quite-finished commissioned piece I was writing about, and below it, the practice piece where I worked out solutions to the problems I encountered along the way.

Oil painting of the view from a balcony at Sanctuary By The Sea, Santa Rosa Beach, Florida: Redfish Lake and the Gulf of Mexico 24 x 36, commissioned oil painting, view of Redfish Lake and the Gulf of Mexico from Sanctuary By the Sea
Practice piece for commissioned oil painting of the view from a balcony at Sanctuary By The Sea, Santa Rosa Beach, Florida: Redfish Lake and the Gulf of Mexico 16 x 20, practice for commissioned piece above

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Brighter Colors in Plein Air Painting

Oil painting of Hogtown Bayou looking west from Cessna Landing

I was showing a friend my paintings in my studio last weekend, and she remarked on the light and color of one row of paintings, which indeed were more vibrant than almost all of my other work.  I explained that none of the five were plein air, that they were exercises done in a workshop I took last summer, from Julie Gilbert Pollard, “Wet and Wild:  Painting Vibrant Water Scenes in Brilliant Color” (See my blog post).  Ordinarily, that would have explained the difference as far as I was concerned, but I started thinking more about it.  Granted, Julie taught us to use bright under-painting, and to use color for its value, rather than strictly for its hue.  But as I looked around at my paintings, I realized that at the time I was painting them, I thought I was painting very brightly, but in the studio they looked a less brilliant.  Then it dawned on me — I try to paint the colors that I see when I paint plein air.  And usually the sun is shining brightly, so light and color are at their optimum.  But when I bring my paintings indoors, the light invariably is never as bright as the sun, even using “daylight” bulbs.  When I take those same paintings into the sunlight, they are much brighter.  So I realized that in order for my paintings to have the same brilliance of color indoors that I see when I am painting them, I might need to paint with brighter color than what I see.  I’m going to think about that some more.

For today’s plein air session I took some canvas panels that were already under-painted, like we did in that workshop in July.  I had under-painted two 8×10 panels with red, and a third 6×6 with sort of a buff color.  I let some of the under-paintings show through, not covering the entire canvas with paint.  and I scratched out some of the grass and tree trucks, revealing the underlying color.  Below are my results.

Oil painting of Hogtown Bayou looking west from Cessna Landing

Oil painting of trees on the far side of Cessna Landing at Hogtown Bayou

Oil painting of soft grass at edge of Hogtown Bayou