Once Again...

'Passages' 16x16 Oil Plein Air

I Haven't Posted On......

....this blog, my website, FB or Instagram in well over a year.  Nothing.  It has felt good but it may be time to return.  

I needed some time off and some creative privacy, I guess.  I kept painting, studying and even taught a few courses but I was tired of media.  Still am, but decided it was time to share again and see if I could change the terms of engagement.  No, I don't yet know what that means other than not taking it seriously, despite what the online marketers recommend.

In the interim a few changes I hadn't expected crept in.  Being trained mostly by Sergei Bongart's teaching assistants I once used a color palette of up to 18 hues.  Over the years that number shrank slowly until around 2005 it was down to 9 colors, a split primary palette with a couple 'kickers'.   It is interesting and significant that the number kept going down.  I'm now at 3 tubes of color plus white.  I keep a standard primary palette of a red, a yellow and a blue in differing temperatures and saturations.   I will switch out one or more of those hues when I think it's appropriate or when I want a challenge or just to see what happens.  The number still stays at three colors.

Both of these plein air pieces use the same palette except for the blues, one done with Ultramarine Blue and the other Prussian Blue ('Passages', 16x16 PB and 'Morning in the Gardens', 10x20 UB at Battle Point Park).  I'm really rather amazed at the variety of colors that can be achieved and the subsequent color harmony.

A couple of things that sort of happened at the same time in terms of materials also helped re-enthuse me to paint and explore.  I'll talk about those next time.

 'Morning in the Gardens', 10x20, Oil, Plein Air

Thanks for looking.  Come back again.

 

Spring, 10x12 and 11x14

These were painted about a week apart in response to having the Spring colors begin to show, the winter colors quickly fading.

There is such vibrance in the landscape as the greens start to poke through, and even the winter colors seem more intense and vital before that green appears.  My intention is always to spend every day exploring and painting the landscape but the reality of Spring is also that there is a lot that needs doing.  There never is enough time or energy for all of it.

'At the Head of the Harbor' (top) is 10x12 and 'Port Blakely Spring' is 11x14.   This second one was interesting for the challenge in all the doo-dads of the ground litter.  The only way I found to make it work was to eliminate about seventy-five percent of the stuff, just hinting at what was on the forest floor.  Hopefully the viewer fills in the 'stuff' from their own experience in a forest.

Maybe I'll go back again and explore the changes and colors...tomorrow is supposed to be cloudy.  That would be interesting.

I'll be back.

Thanks for looking!