Bernie again

Bernie has posed many times for our Wednesday morning sketch group and he is always fun to sketch.  He is a wonderful old gentleman who has a really craggy face and always looks miserable. One would think that getting a likeness of a face with this much character would be easier than a plain face that looks like everyone else but I don't find that to be the case.  If you have a person with a very average face all you have to do is get the shapes relatively right and it looks like them.  It looks like a lot of other people too but it looks like them.  With a face like Bernie's you have to get all the odd shapes and nooks and crannies correct or it looks nothing like him. 

I like this sketch but it doesn't look like Bernie or at least it doesn't look the way I feel Bernie should look.

A Great Day to be Canadian

Yesterday was as close to a perfect day as it gets.  I went out and voted in the morning, painted in shirtsleeves in the sunny afternoon, had a wonderful turkey supper with Debbie, watched the Toronto Blue Jays beat the Kansas City Royals and then watched the very divisive Conservative party get removed from power. I love being Canadian.

About a dozen of us gathered at Hidden Valley Park in Burlington to paint fall colours.  The colour was past its peak and not all that impressive however it was sunny and very warm so a great October day to paint.  This pine tree seemed to be dancing in the park and I thought that it could be a very dramatic composition.

I always start a painting by putting a thin layer of a mood setting colour (in this case cadmium red light mixed with transparent iron oxide) on my board using oil paint.  I then wipe out the highlights and add some darks to get a sense form.  This under painting usually gets almost completely covered with more paint however in this case when the painting was complete except for the sky four different artists (all of whom I respect) came by and told me that they loved the sky so guess what. No blue sky.

I kind of like it.  What do you think? 

We painted at Kerncliff Park in Burlington on Thursday.  It is one of my favourite painting locations at any time but in the fall it is especially grand.  The colour in this old quarry is magnificent and I have failed at every attempt to paint it.  This one is my best to date probably because it is so much fun to let the colourist in me loose.




I spent the week before Thanksgiving paddling in Algonquin Park with my son Nathan and five of his friends.  The very generous deal was that I was exempt from chores provided I painted.  I again failed rather miserably with acrylic paint but I am getting a better feel for how it works so I will keep at it.  You can play with oils but acrylics dry way too fast for my liking.  I used some retarder this time and that helped.  This is the best of the three completed paintings.



I did a few watercolour sketches along the way and this one is of  our mascot "Trojan" who is a rubber chicken that showed up in the oddest places during the trip.

Highlands East Plein Air Arts Festival.

The Highlands East Plein Air Arts Festival ran from September 10 to the 13.  We painted for three days, attended a great bbq and then had a show and sale on the closing Sunday.  Eleven artists attended this year which is very disappointing but I am sure that it will grow.  We had a blast painting at wonderful locations and socializing with locals and other artists. About a dozen paintings sold which is fantastic for a festival in its second year.

We went to paint the Irondale church but when we got there it was encased in scafholding with most of the paint stripped off the front.  The sunlight was coming just over the top of the trees causing the steeple to glow so I decided on a macro.  I think that it worked and I am very happy with this painting.



The painting right is of Gooderham Lake from the "Old Parish Place"  It was a huge treed property that is being protected by its owners.  The only downside was that it is heavily treed and I was in very dark shade painting this.  I could make out the values but colour was mostly guesswork.

This painting was painted at Greenmantle Farm which is home to a rare mineral called fluorrichterite.  It is also a property that is being protected by its very friendly owners and they go an extra mile.  They lead eco tours on their property.





This last painting was painted at Centre Lake.  It is favourite location and I have painted this scene numerous times.  This was our third day painting and I was exhausted but I can't think of a better location to finish three intense days of painting.

A weekend like this is definitely good for the soul.

Manorun Farm

The Monday Painters were invited to spend two Monday afternoons on Manorun Organic Farm in Copetown.  This is an organic co-op and a great example of sustainable farming.  They are a family farm with interns helping and learning.  Everyone was smiling and friendly.  Add to that the fact that I could paint here every day for a month and not run out of subject matter and I was as happy as a farm pig in its pen.

They had a big and very old silo that I think was made from ceramic blocks.  We didn't go in it but one of the interns is calling it home.  I became a bit fixated on it because it was so unusual and ended up painting it both weeks.  This first painting was done from very close to the car in the shade of a huge willow tree.




I discovered that if I hiked down the farm lane a bit, climbed a rather steep embankment and avoided the electric fence I could stand in knee deep grass and get a view of the entrance to the silo/guest house.  I lost my coffee mug in the grass somewhere but it was rather worth it.


One would think that being inspired would make things easier however I find that it often means I get frustrated and overwork my painting.  There is simply too much pressure to get it right. That happened with both of these to a certain extent.  I am happy with both of them more because of the wonderful memories than because they are great paintings. 

Love this weather

I have been painting lots but not posting much.  Here are a couple of my latest efforts.



This first painting was painted from the top of Rattlesnake Point.  It was a fantastic day with fish scale clouds and no haze.  Perfect for this kind of vista.  I have never painted here before but I will be back.  My goal with this painting was to capture the perspective.  We are a long way up and can see forever.



I have been sketching more.  These watercolour and ink sketches are just plain fun to do.  The first one is of an artist friend at one of our paint outs.  The second one is of the Rails End Gallery in Haliburton.  I had two paintings in an invitational plein air show there and Debbie and I drove up there to retrieve them. Nothing breaks up seven hours on the road like half an hour sketching.

Debbie and I are driving to British Columbia this summer so I can see some paintings and a ton of sketches in my future.

Yeah! I have a camera again.

I haven't posted in over a month because I didn't have a camera and images from my phone are terrible.  That was corrected with the purchase of a battery charger for my camera.  I have been busy painting up a storm but I am so far behind in my documentation that I may never get caught up.  Here are a few of my recent attempts.


These first two were painted at my parents home on Paudash Lake. The horizontal painting is the view from the front yard and the vertical is the view from the back yard.

 I love painting skies despite the fact that they extremely challenging. Painting outside means dealing with constantly changing light however usually your subject is relatively static.  Clouds on the other hand are constantly moving and the more interesting they are the faster they move.

It is very easy to fall into the trap of painting what you think clouds should look like rather than looking at them and painting the way they actually appear at that given moment in time.

This last painting was painted in Crooks Hollow at the site of the original dam.  It was on a very damp and humid evening. This is one of my favourite places to spend time working because it is so peaceful.