Low Light Painting

I am taking Catherine Gibbon's Low Light Outdoor Landscape class again for inspiration.  This is a good class for me because it gets me out painting in the evenings when the light is warm and the shadows long. It is also challenging because the light is changing so very fast.

Tuesday was a chilly and very dull grey early spring evening so there were no shadows and very little colour. I didn't want a dull grey painting so I decided to work with a limited palette based on two complimentary colours a red violet and a yellow. This painting is 11" X 14".

This second painting is the same location but using a different but still limited palette. This one is 9" X 12". I think that I managed to get the feel of the evening with both of these and the limited palettes made it much more relaxing and fun.

I am excited about painting again and even got up early enough to pack up my watercolours and head to Burlington for the sketch group yesterday morning.  I was glad that I did because Vivian is always a joy to paint.  It is fun to be using my watercolours again.

Feeling Good Again

I have been very busy of late and am playing catch up again.  This was painted Monday at the top of King Road in Burlington. The location has a fantastic view looking off the top of the escarpment over Burlington to Burlington Bay and beyond.  Others were jockeying for positions where they could look out with no trees in the way however I elected to back up about thirty feet from the cliff face so that there were trees in the foreground.  I had fun painting this and am excited.  Not perfect but much better than most of late so I am a very happy artist.

I should add that the diagonal line across the water is actually the Skyway bridge.  It should be lighter and bluer but I missed that.  Oh well.

I Think I'm Back

It has been really easy to let ballroom dancing, gardening and even painting the inside of the house from top to bottom replace my art.   I have been avoiding painting because I have been working the same way over and over but somehow hoping for a better result.  I was getting very frustrated and finally gave up.


Last night in the first class of Catherine Gibbon's low light landscape course I decided to go back to basics and the more intense colour that I love so much.  I also decided there would be no fiddling.  As the strokes went down they would stay untouched.  I didn't end up with even a close to perfect painting but I am really excited about this because it was for the most part fun.

I can't wait to paint again.

It's Happy Dance Time again.

Where has the time gone.  I have been caught up in other things and haven't painted in over a month and now I am scrambling to find paintings to put into five different group shows.

Today I submitted a painting to the Art Gallery of Burlington's annual juried show.  I am really excited to say that this painting painted during the Wilberforce Plein Air Arts Festival last September was accepted.  That is three years in a row that I have managed to get paintings juried in and I am a bit concerned because my head seems to be swelling.

It is especially exciting because I am up against most of the best artists in Burlington and area and I believe that mine was the only plein air piece accepted.  The others are all studio pieces and therefore much more refined.

The other big benefit is that I am now motivated to dump everything and get painting.  It is time to satisfy my cravings.  Bring on the paint.

Leah

Wednesdays sketch group was very crowded this week.  There was at least a couple of dozen artists all vying for a decent spot in front of the model.  I got there early so I did get a good view however I couldn't get back from my work to see it at a distance.

Leah is a wonderful model and a joy to paint.

I need to hearken back to grade nine art class.  We did a painting that looked like the inside of a lava lamp as an exercise in painting rounded forms. When I painted Leah I was attempting to copy the shapes of the shadows without thinking about the actual form that was creating the shadow.  If I had been thinking of the form I would have realized one cheek is higher than the other and one eyelid is fuller than the other.  At least I now have a warm skin tone that I am happy with so onward and upward.

Horses and a Barn

Today was a fun day to paint.  It was about 2 C and mostly sunny with some wispy clouds so not at all cold.  We painted at Debbie Carson's farm just outside Dundas. The property has horses, a big red barn and a view of the Dundas peak none of which I painted.  I painted a scene looking off the back of the hill mostly because everyone else was painting the obvious.

I am excited about this painting mostly because it was fun.  I felt that I was always painting with the same palette and it was getting rather formulaic and stale so I switched back to the cyan, magenta, yellow colour wheel to get me thinking about what I am doing.  I may stick with this for a while because the colours are much more transparent, less prone to mud and very intense.   It will take some practice to tame these pigments but I had a great time working with them. Now to figure out a way to get the very intense Thalo blue off my nose.

Mary

I managed to get to the sketch group for the first time since November.  I was getting ready to go when I realized that I didn't have any pastel paper so I took my watercolours.  I was more than a bit nervous because I haven't done a watercolour portrait in years and there are at least twenty very good artists in this group.

Mary was an excellent model and a pleasure to paint.  I captured her likeness however she isn't quite so purple even with the reflections from her outfit.  I am okay with this since it has been so long however I really do need to remember what my portrait palette was.  I had forgotten how much fun it is to work with watercolours and I may stick with them for portraits.


I also did a little work on the painting form Monday.  When the ice crystals
melted it left a very ugly grainy texture so I smoothed that out.  I also softened the foreground tree a bit and removed some of the ragged brushwork.  It is better but I am still not happy with it.  I love the background but the tree still bugs me.