Montana Snow Paintings

I was in Montana last week at Big Sky and brought oil paint, boards and an easel.  In the frigid weather, I found it best to paint on the porch of the house we were in so that I could periodically take refuge indoors and warm up. I had to shovel off a fair bit of snow to make a spot to set up, but the view of the north side of Lone Peak was just fine.

I was using a lot of white paint and the paintings are really wet since white takes so long to dry.  I've painted on trips before using gouache and acrylic, but oil paint is definitely better for me.  I unpacked the wet paintings last night (they came home in a box that had a ridged piece of plastic on each side to keep them separate) and they made it home in pretty good shape.

Shirtless Painting

We've got a clause in our Studio B lease that specifies we can't be shirtless in the studio.  It wasn't something that entered my mind, ever, as a possibility, so it seemed weird that it was in the lease.

I'm reading Man with a Blue Scarf, a book by Martin Gayford, which is a diary of sorts of the time he spent sitting for his portrait by Lucian Freud.

This may explain my lease:

Lilacs with a Warm Shadow

Now that I realized I have to choose the time of day for the wedding dress painting, I put it aside.  If I'm keeping the morning reflections in the window,  I can't work on it in the afternoon.

Instead, I went back to the lilac arrangement on the desk I painted last month for another variation.  This time, instead of the cool gray shadow, I painted the shadow in a warm color.  I chose a smaller canvas, different angle and narrower view (no distant corner of the room) to make the shadow an even bigger part of the painting.  It's at a pretty simple stage right now and I'll work on it tomorrow afternoon too and see where it goes from here.

Today's painting of the lilac arrangement -- in progress

This is what I painted last month

Stages of a Painting

This is going to go through a lot of stages...   Today I realized that I'm not used to painting with natural light while inside a studio.  My South-facing window, which seemed pretty constantly bright to me, does in fact include reflections in the morning that are gone by afternoon.   The question is whether to include them or not.

I painted in the reflection today, and, in order to make the lights more luminous, darkened and dulled the shadows and interior wall to a color closer to the real silver-green paint on the walls.  Interesting, definitely both improved and diminished the effect I was trying for.  To make the range of light, reflection and shadow just in the window alone, I've got a range of blues, grays, greenish blues, violets and cool whites...and I think the result is pretty mixed.  The cerulean in the upper right corner definitely has to go.

Studio News, Shows, Wedding Dress Painting

Studio B moving day is January 2, 2014!

While I've got a piece showing every month at the Foundry Gallery, I've got a solo show (which is to say, a lot of my work) in April 2014 at the Foundry in Washington, DC.  And in July 2014, I'll be in a group show at Gallery B in Bethesda.  At Studio B, I'll have work on display, paintings in progress and an open studio night the 2nd Friday of every month.

The April show will have its opening reception on Friday, April 4, which happens to be my wedding anniversary.  It got me thinking about the wedding dress that's been hanging in my various closets over the years, completely unprotected and definitely showing signs of age (not to mention the style, so 1982).  I hung it up in the window of my home studio and the yellowed cotton dress, light behind it and  streaming through it suggested a painting to me.  This is where it is so far.

Morning Light in the Kitchen

I was reading the paper early this morning (too early -- thanks to my early rising dog) and light was streaming through the full glass kitchen door.  Thought it was worth trying to grab it for a painting. Here's what's a little embarrassing -- the color of the scene reminded me a bit of Van Gogh's bedroom painting, the one with the warm orange floor and cool blue wall, light coming through a bright window. If you look at Van Gogh's painting, well,  maybe the shape of the light in my kitchen and the shape of his bed... nevermind, it was just an idea.  I'd seen the Van Gogh painting over the weekend at the Phillips Collection's fantastic special exhibit.

Not sure if this will be just another start that I abandon, or if I'll keep playing with it.  By the way, the objects on the counter are two glass orbs filled with cranberries.  

Soon to Be At Studio B!

We got the official word today!  Artist LInda Button and I will be sharing a studio at Bethesda's Studio B!  This is what the outside of the space looks like -- there are three studios inside when you go down the hall.  We'll be in the first one.  The space is in the Air Rights Building, which is connected to Bethesda Metro by a tunnel.

We'll be moving in sometime int he next month, planning to be fully in the space by January 6.

Light in June - start of a painting

You will see blogs that feature daily painters -- people who work on and finish a small 6 x 6 inch painting every day.  A lot of them are fruit and cupcakes, maybe just a little formulaic and sweet, however technically accomplished they may be.  I mention this because I think I am heading into having a blog of the paintings I start but never finish.  Having just made myself a promise that with the cold weather forcing me to stay in studio, I would work on paintings I'd started before and actually finish them... I couldn't face the stacks of paintings in my studio.  Nice idea anyway.  

Since last June, when I participated in a show at Gallery B in Bethesda, I've been thinking about an afternoon when the light was streaming into the gallery and through a vase. I'd cut flowers from my garden that morning to put out --  lilacs and "puffs" and leaves from purple smoke bush (cotinus coggygria). It was too bad, really, that another of the artists in our show was allergic to lilacs!  So the arrangement didn't stay there for long.   There was warm light coming through the vase and cool light coming through the tinted windows and it was just beautiful.  I took a photo so I could remember it.  And now, so I could paint it.  Or at least start painting it.  

Under the Bridge

This is the last planned day of outdoor painting -- how amazing that the weather was warm, sunny and beautiful!

I think I painted this bridge 7 or 10 years ago, but have crossed it many, many times on the way to paint along the canal or hike the Billy Goat Trail.  Today I chose a slightly sheltered spot to try to get my light painting set up out of the wind.

The goal painting this was to get you to look under the bridge. In spite of how softly I painted the bridge railing, it's hard not to focus in on the wood forms.  Still, I think I got that dark reflected water under the bridge to draw your eye down there.

Canal Vision & Updating

On Monday, I set up at the same spot as last week.  Many more leaves had fallen, so the view of the Potomac river was clearer.  It was a crisp, brilliant, calm day, so the reflection in the river was striking.

On Wednesday, rather than brave the cold, I set this up in the studio to see if I could work the shapes within the landscape and use thicker paint than I'd splashed on when I was outside.