plein air NJ

Woke up late this morning, and it was cloudy, so we weren't going to go out painting. But the sun came out so we went.

I'm glad we did--even though I found when we set up that I had apparently lost a crucial part of my easel in Maine.

We went out to a spot overlooking the ocean and had a good time trying to capture the beautiful ever- and rapidly changing sky!

2 sketchbook pages above, and 2 8x14 painting below.

catching up

Catching up on my class with SaltyWaterArt.

Each one of these could use some tweaking, and maybe I will touch them up later. 

It's fun to change up the colors and see where it goes. I should have gone one further!

.                             5x7each

home

                            10x12

Got home Monday evening. Yesterday puttered about, then went out for my Tuesday night Guinnesses; today trying to get up to speed.

But I want to keep painting ...

So here is a largely imagined painting of rocks!

I get a little careless with carving out the shapes, so I decided to stop here.

last day in Maine

                             4x9

.                          10x12

.                            9x11

On our last day we took a ferry from Bar Harbor to the wonderfully named Winter Harbor on the Schoodic Peninsula, and, once there, the free bus to rocky Schoodic Point, where we perched on some flat rocks and painted.

We had an hour before the ferry came and spent it drinking beer at the Pickled Wrinkle.

Then back to Southwest Harbor for a final lobster!

Maine 4

Sketchbook pages from Otter's Point, above, and the Seawall picnic area in Acadia.

We didnt bring our full watercolor kits and then found when we got to Seawall, the perfect place to set up ... But we had sketchbooks and colored pencils.

Sketching can be a nice break from the anxiety of wanting to produce a "good" painting.

We also visited the Bass Harbor Head lighthouse today and got this a photo of this iconic view!

Maine 3

.                             11x15

Friday morning we met up with an art teacher of mine, Leigh Culver ( check her out on Instagram), who recommended we go to Otter's Point--a fantastic recommendation.

We plunked ourselves down just off the path and had a go at painting the sublime view. Of course we both found our results somewhat disappointing, but we now have tons of photos of rocky, tree coved coastine to paint when we're back in NJ.

Maine 2

                              14x16

.                              12x14

Yesterday we took the ferry to Monhegan Island, which is beyond beautiful. I'll post some pix later.

It's a lot of terrain to cover carrying all the painting gear so we didn't see the whole island. But we did make it to the southern point of the island, Lobster Cove.

Happy anniversary, Peg and Dan.

Maine so far

The low tide outside our cottage.

Got to our cottage Sunday afternoon, and have been doing some sketching or painting every day. Along with having some great food and drink and meeting a lot of nice people.

Tomorrow we're taking the ferry to Monhegan.

A tree outside our cottage.

Couple of scenes from Portland Head Lighthouse park.

old paintings

Also found these, from my first watercolor class, which I took at Cooper Union in NYC, my father's alma mater.

The instructor focused on glazes. These have a flatness and lack of strong value contrast that appeals to me.

I wish I could remember her name, she was a good teacher and really got me interested in watercolor.

old drawings

Cleaning out my flat file and found these drawings for the drawing class I took in college. I won't tell you how long ago that was. But several of these buildings are now gone, replaced my mansions.

la bella luna

Trying to paint the full moon!

John Marin copies

Trying to copy a couple of Marins.

Difficult but engrossing.

Learned a couple of things:

He uses a lot of black-- or at least that's what I used to approximate the colors on my reproductions: both grayed and full strength. Or mixed with colors, esp. greens 

He uses shorthand marks: squiggles and upside down Vs for trees; small slashes for grasses.

He doesn't mind outlining.

My colors lack the subtlety of his (my copies are about half the size of his, and done quickly). And I'm not too good with the charcoal.

But I did feel like it helped me gain some insight into Marin's practice.