6x8 spree

Clouds over land - oil on panel - 6" x 8"

Rain at Barnet #1 - oil on panel - 6" x 8"

 Rain at Barnet #2- oil on panel - 8" x 6"

I ate an apple first before I started the painting. It gave me time to sit there and observe and form a plan of attach. I knew I had to exercise great restraint on values, and that mental preparation was useful when I was in the heat of painting.

Hazy afternoon at Crab park - oil on panel - 6" x 8"

small sketches by Sorolla

Small work like these by Sorolla, without the need for small details, are very charming to me.

El Retiro, Madrid - Joaquin Sorolla y Bastida

Levantine landscape - Joaquin Sorolla y Bastida

Lady and Dog on the Beach, 1906 - Joaquin Sorolla y Bastida

Paisaje marino del Monte Ulía  - Joaquin Sorolla y Bastida

Painting On Biarritz Beach - Joaquin Sorolla y Bastida

- Joaquin Sorolla y Bastida

Washerwomen  - Joaquin Sorolla y Bastida

A not so smooth week

  This one was painted on my birthday:

birthday painting - oil on panel - 12" x 9"

The past week hasn't been easy on the outdoor painting side. Many paintings had to be 'rescued' at home. I also did a studio piece based on a failed plein air study. The studio painting ended up being very tight. I was able to try out some new ideas on it but I don't think I want to show it.

The weather in the last week was just beautiful. There were picturesque clouds almost everyday, and lots of variety in a day. When I started this below painting, there was a chance of rain. It was dark and gloomy, I didn't have to worry about which way I position my surface. Half way through, the sun came out, shinning through the trees behind me casting dappled shadows on my surface, making it near impossible to paint. I had to move my easel to face a different direction.
Anyway,  it wasn't a very good painting when I was done, and I felt defeated. It took some time at home to bring this painting back to life. At least the design was sound. If it wasn't, I would not have been able to do anything to help it.

River side board walk with rhododendron bloom - oil on panel - 9" x 12"

I decided to redeem myself after the defeat above, and did a quick small sketch, I rushed in and the design did not work. I was about to scrape it when I got home, but decided to experiment on it. I fixed some major design issues; played around with impressionistic colours; and enhanced the design by adding a couple elements. At the end I think I salvaged it.

experiment - oil on panel - 6" x 8"

Iona beach has been absolutely beautiful, lot's of spring flowers in bloom, including lupine. Here I attempted a triangular design from what I have learned in Edgar Payne's "Composition of outdoor painting". The clouds were moving so fast, the only way for me to paint it was to quickly draw out the shapes of the clouds that I want to keep, then start defining volume by looking at the clouds in front of me that were in different shapes. There was some over-modeling in the clouds. When the painting was touch dry I applied a thin white glaze over it to lower the contrast.

Iona cloud formation - oil on panel - 6" x 8"

This one too was a disaster when I finished it on the beach. When I started it it was dark and rainy as you can see in the top of the painting, where I began the painting. When I got to the foreground the sun was so bright, bouncing off the sand and bleached my surface. Since I knew the light was changing fast, and that I wanted the painting to be loose, I did not do enough drawing before I began, so the logs were just a mess.

I came home and scraped all the bottom 2/3 off and re-painted from memory and photo, and again I feel that it's saved. I was able to maintain the same loose strokes, as well as using colours that I observed on the beach that were not present in the photograph.

Lesson learned (for the 10th time): Have the patience to do a good drawing for a complex scene.

 Day of change - oil on panel - 9" x 12"

Another painting that was started in the sunshine and finished in overcast. Though for this one I barely had to do anything back at home other than describe the red bush a little better and a couple other minor touches.

lane way cloud formation  - oil on panel - 6" x 8"

How I like to paint

I enjoy looking at good paintings done in many variations, but some are closer to my heart. I am learning that I don't like it when my paintings get too detailed and descriptive. Realism is kind of important, by that I mean the perspective is right, a tree looks like a tree, and a person looks like a person, not crude. At the same time, I don't want to be painting a tree by describing its every branch and leaf; I want to paint the tree by how it reflects light. By that I mean when I paint the tree, I want to think 'light', not 'tree'. Sargent painted the shapes of light as the subject reflected it, and he made it look easy. A satin dress was not a satin skirt, it was a purple shape in the shadow, and a cool white shape in the light, and after a few strokes it's done (likely very slowly and carefully), and looked exactly like satin, and that's poetry.

Poetry is graceful, purposeful and should not be too literal. It should be like a book with many possibilities in the beginning, but not too vague to lose the readers in the first chapter.

Painting out doors is important to me, simply because I can't paint indoors very well. I am not a very imaginative person and nature takes the guessing game out of painting. When I was sitting on a stump by the river in the below painting, my eyes showed me all these bright purples on the top-facing planes of the sun-bleached logs; the sandy edges of the river was a dark warm reddish purple with streaks of blue of sky reflection. My eyes told me to cover the large grass area quickly and evenly, as there's not much important information there... Nature would present everything I needed in front of me, and I just had to be receptive, know how to read her, and dance with her, sometimes I lead, sometimes she leads.

Water way at Iona Island - oil on panel - 6" x 8"

spring in full spring

Everything is green, and the green is covering up the sky. It's hiding the million branches and creating large mass of volume, and casts bigger shadows. It filters the light, gives green ambiance everywhere under its canopy.



I stopped at these maples at Deer Lake, they reminded me of the landscape of Forêt de Fontainebleau, that drew the Barbizon painters as well as Monet in his early career.

Thinking about Forest Fontainebleau - oil on panel - 9" x 12"

I did the same view here this past winter at the Burnaby mountain park. It was foggy and it was the only way I could have painted it.

Ainu totem poles in spring - oil on panel - 6" x 8"

Picking back up pace

Last Saturday I participated in the Opus outdoor challenge, a plein air painting competition. I didn't win anything but it's was nice to see so many other fellow artists out there making art. I was told there were more than 300 participants at the Granville Island location.

Granville Island is visually very busy. I wanted to find a view that was simple and yet the same time representative enough that people could tell it's Granville Island. Having had not scouted out the place the day before, I spent more than an hour walking the whole island to finally settle  on my spot.

This was my entry:

 

This is after I tidied it up later at home

East end of Granville Island - oil on panel - 9" x 12"

When I came back from the still-brown NY, it was the lush greeneries in Vancouver that awaited m. I went back to Central Park to see what had changed. Honestly not much has changed there since the park is dominated by evergreens.  The setting sun was directly behind me shinning straight on the pines in front of me, flattening out their shapes completely, making them look paper thin.

Paper thin - oil on panel - 12" x 9"

From yesterday:

Arrangement of trees - oil on panel - 12" x 9"

I just started reading "Composition of outdoor painting" by Edgar Payn. I am only a couple chapters in but it has made an impact on me. The above painting has more thinking involved thanks to the book.

First painting back to the west coast

It sure is different to come home. When I left for NY, Vancouver was in full spring, everything was green but not quite . When I came back it felt like summer. Everything looked different, new shapes, new shadows, new colours...

North Shore in May - oil on panel - 9" x 12"

Paintings from New York State

I was away for 3 weeks in NY visiting family. I managed to squeeze out a dozen paintings. I could have done more, but we made an impromptu trip to New York city and I had to ship the paints back home a few days early as I didn't want to risk bring them with me on the plane.

Here are some of them:



First painting I did there.

Village of Penn Yan - oil on panel - 6" x 8"

My brother-in-law drove me around the area and we found inspiration at this cemetery.

A resting place - oil on panel - 6" x 8"

A Mennonite woman came by with her children as I was working. When I finished the painting I crossed the road to show it to her husband as it's their vineyard. They all enjoyed looking at the painting, though they didn't own a camera to take a picture of it.

A Mennonite vineyard - oil on panel - 9" x 12"

After the storm on Keuka Lake - oil on panel - 12" x 9"

I was only able to complete only about 50% of it on location. I was high on a hill, so the sun set behind me earlier than I expected. I finished the rest at where I stayed from looking at the screen on my digital camera.

Bluff afternoon - oil on panel - 9" x 12"

Outlet creek - oil on panel - 9" x 12"

Windy day at Indian Pine park - oil on panel - 6" x 8"

This is a very special painting to me. It was done on the property of our friends Pete and Elaine. I have visited their farm for many years, and enjoyed tremendously each visit. This time I finally had the chance to make a painting there, only wish there was more time for me to do more.

Carlie and Katie - oil on panel - 9" x 12"

During my 3 weeks there, the leaves were just starting to bud. Hills of red buds appear purple in the distance. I tried to capture that in several paintings.

Willem Bastiaan Tholen

I have just learned about Willem Bastiaan Tholen (1860 - 1931) from Holland.
I am a sucker for naturalistic paintings. These paintings of his are special to me:


This is such a everyday encounter one would have at a near by park.

Willem Bastiaan Tholen

A painting of a back yard with dirt floor with a bold design.

Willem Bastiaan Tholen

A painting that required masterful restraint. 

Willem Bastiaan Tholen