Summer Landscapes

Every day this past summer (2013) I painted small (6" x 9") landscapes on paper. I used paper so I could concentrate on the composition and color. When I work on canvas I paint and repaint for days and instead I wanted to look at my day's solution and move forward with a response in a subsequent painting.

Elephant Murals

Two murals. Abstract elephants from zoo sketches. 4' x 4' and 4' x 6'.

Still Life Progression

After looking at this painting on the wall for several months I started thinking of the oranges and espresso maker in simpler forms and repainted them.

And then painted some more...

I didn't want the painting to get too thick or have too many painted over forms so I took it into Photoshop to try different background color and more shapes.

And then I painted the final version.

For now.

Acrylic on linen.

Sweetgum

Liquidambar styraciflua - the spiky fruits of the American Sweetgum. 

In pencil - with a diameter of 18". 

Abstracted and repeated.

Photoshopped into art museums*.

*thanks to Martin

Milkweed

Milkweed pods. In pencil - three foot giants on my easel - and in watercolor (8.5" x 11"). Almost all of the seeds blown away.

A year of watercolor

I thought watercolor would be an easy way to sketch with color on location, but I wasn't very adept at the color part of it...or the brush part of sketching.

From my sketchbooks in 2010 and May 2012.

I started in the summer of 2012. And practiced and practiced - times about a thousand.  I used the books of Charles Reid as a guide to learn to use lots of colors and be looser with brushes.
 (Reid likes splashes so I tried them, too).

I kept practicing. (without the splashing)

Using photos. 

Painting from my sketches.

Finally, in January 2013, painting from life (the backyard).

Way back in February

 

We had so little snow this past winter. One Saturday morning I woke up to a foot of it plus sun. I spent the day running from window to window painting little 8"x 8" canvases of all the shadows, shrubs and trees. Of the ten paintings I did only this one looked good the next day. 

This is my process: paint a lot, look and respond, and then weed. I've been disappointed in previous attempts to take a painting further and make it more finished after a plein air session. So I started a new canvas with the one above as the study.

Above is the result.
I see merits in both. Drawing and painting directly from nature has a spontaneity that I like, but often the brush work looks less polished and the paint doesn't cover all of the canvas. The colors in the second painting are bright, I've thought more of composition and there's paint from corner to corner. It is a different painting, though.