wip

Today is national poinsettia day; also the feast day of the Virgin of Guadalupe; also my birthday. Thank you, Mom and Dad! I miss you both, especially today.

                             

classwork

                              11x15

Cottonwoods in NM, painted in class with SaltyWater Art.

Was thinking I should neutralize some of the color a bit ...

homework

The final assignment for a Susan Abbott workshop I'm taking, Inventing Color (through the Winslow Art Center).

If you know Susan's work you know her sense of color is powerful. Looking at her work leaves me wanting to break free of local color. Idk if I'll be able, in my daily practice, to push color as far as I have in these assignments. But ... I am thinking much more about color value and temperature, and about the power of pure color.

If you haven't taken a workshop with Susan I can highly recommend it. This is, I think, my fifth: 4 online. 1 in Vermont. Aside from being a thoughtful and accomplished painter, in watercolor and oil, Susan is a great teacher, with well-structured and eye-opening lessons and exercises; her feedback I have always found to be on point. I really appreciate how she takes me, and everyone in the class, seriously as an artist who wants to  learn and find my way while meeting me where I am.

Can't wait for the next one.

homework

Homework assignment: paint the same scene, one using a warm triad, the other a cool triad, trying to maintain the value relationships of the reference.

I find it surprisingly difficult to assess colors' values ... I guess that's why my paintings generally don't have strong value contrast?

another "tiny"

                              8x8

Another "tiny."

I posted the first one below.

As usual, there are things I like and don't like about each!

classwork

Two smallish, 5x9, studies of cottonwood trees for a class with SaltyWater Art.

Have drawn these both larger and hope to get to them soon!

homework

An exercise from my Susan Abbott class: painting a small still life using complements and the colors you can mix from them. I found it difficult deciding where to put what color.

Susan pointed out that I could have used more pure color in the cloth pattern, which was a great suggestion.

Grids of colors mixed from sets of complements, going from the lightest to the darkest value.

"tinies"

                               8x8

We had a guest speaker in one of my classes, Amy Pollien, a painter based in Maine; her work is pretty incredible, quite detailed and precise ... Not something I could ever do, but she presented ideas and techniques that I could try. Things like using plein air paintings in a more exploratory way, as a way to find a focus, or like "the dead hand," which is a way of applying paint to the canvas or paper: just "place" it and leave it, don't move it around ...

Here I'm using her practice of making 8x8 "tinies" as a way of testing out a subject, seeing if it's something you'd pursue further.

I have a couple of small branches of dried up oak leaves that I have been wanting to paint, but they look so confusing I doubted I could do anything with them.

push together?

                           8x10

This got a little crazy.

Susan Abbott says you should look at your painting and ask if it needs to be "pushed apart or pulled together."

This one definitely needs some pulling together ... Will have to think about; maybe a big wash somewhere.

snowscene

                           8x10

Snow was forecast overnight here, but didn't happen. I was so disappointed. If it's going to be cold, you may as well have snow!

I painted this scene along with a video by Anne Kullaf. I enjoyed it.

She used a triad-- ultramarine, carmine and raw sienna. I found I needed to add cerulean to separate the sky from the trees.

I feel some of my shapes are too clunky or solid and hard edged. I'll try to be mindful of that next time I paint this.

complements

Two subjects that seemed just right for playing with complements and values.

I'm taking an online class with Susan Abbott through the Winslow Art Center and she has got us thinking about the range of colors you can get from complements and also about the impact warm against cool and of pure color.

a gulp

                              8x8

A gulp of crested cormorants taking off from an abandoned lighthouse in the Delaware Bay.

I have a few photos from this tour of lower Delaware Bay lighthouses that I want to paint.

In this one, my sloppiness is good in some places, not so good in others.

trees

Page of trees, playing around with color and salt.

classwork

 I've been taking art history classes with Leigh Culver for a couple of years (you can look for her classes at Winslow art center). The classes always give me a lot to think about but some weeks the lesson just dovetails with where I am.

Last week was like that.

One of the artists Leigh looked at was Joseph Stella.

I'd never seen these works of his before: he would stack or otherwise strange various natural objects.

I happened to notice, after Leigh's lecture, that I had put a little shell on a leaf I'd picked up. And I saw it as a subject for painting

Which I may not have before.

pine cones

                                 12x17

I pick up pine cones. Especially when they're attached to branches.

Occasionally I try to paint them.

It's a subject that always calls to me. Maybe because I can never "get" it.

classwork

                               10x12

Been a while since I painted a bird. I see I need to touch up this flicker's s dots a bit; maybe add a little shading on the breast.

I painted this in a class with Ronna Fujisawa at the Northern Virginia Bird Alliance.

narcissus

                            14x17

One of the narcissus bulbs I'm forcing. Painted on multimedia paper, which can lead to some interesting puddling.

wip

                           10x12

Another work in progress. This one is a fishing boat in Nairn, Scotland.

wip

                           10x12

Starting to revisit my photos from Maine and Scotland. So many great scenes.

This is a scene I saw from the car in Southwest Harbor on Mount Desert Island.

classwork

                                8x12

Painted in class with SaltyWaterArt, a scene from Bend, OR.

I've never been to the NW coast, but I'm hoping maybe next spring.

stone harbor point

Out to Stone harbor point  to paint a jetty.

higbee beach

We went down to a nature preserve on the Delaware Bay, Higbee Beach, for the morning.

The wind was ferocious, but we got tucked in behind a dune.

I was painting in a Bockingford pad. Not sure I like it: very textured. But perhaps I just need to get used to it.

Hereford inlet

Saturday we went to North Wildwood to paint views of Hereford Inlet.

plein air sketching

A friend is visiting this week and we're trying to hike and sketch daily.

Friday we walked around East Point lighthouse where a major project is underway to save it from the rising tides.

Then we walked out to Thompsons Beach on the Delaware Bay.

There used to be a town there, about 170 homes, 107 of which were destroyed by a winter storm in 1950.

It's a nature preserve today.

goldfinches

                            11x15

Started this a while back; finally got back to it.

But now that I've photographed it, I see it's not done: need to work on the branch a bit more and fix the toes-- they look stubby!

classwork

.                            6x8

In order the studies painted in SaltyWaterArt's class.

Probably no tree that's more fun to paint than a birch--those black slashes!

The 3rd one, above, I painted on some 300lb Fabriano I have. I think it stayed wet a bit longer.

Below: started my bigger painting.

I think it might be close to done!

Lately I am really favoring unfinished paintings.

.                            11x15

homework

.                           11x14

                             11x11

Working on a small series of paintings for a class. These are the first two.

Painted from photos I have taken of the old houses built along the creeks here.

Struggling with two others ... So I'm going to take a break from them for a couple of days.