Bromeliads

Bromeliads

This was the most interesting and challenging photo I had from Villa Catalana from last year. I've never painted gravel, or bromeliads, and I wanted to try. Once again I turned to copying a photo, because it was a splendid photo, of truly splendid bromeliads in a beautiful environment. I have not yet gotten good at the art of making up paintings out of my head, there are too many things I want to paint that I don't know how to.

I believe it's the colors that I like most about all these plants, and about the painting.

I've been thinking I need to go on a painting binge again, so today I went through part of my backlog of photos and made a point of picking out the ones that I had a feeling about, mostly the feeling that I had when I took them. Not all of them seem like ideal candidates; some are very simple in composition. I want to see if I can put in any of the magic of place I felt in those locations, and make them come alive.

Sometimes you have to paint detail, darn it

I want to paint loosely; I don't want to paint details. But when it comes to flowers, I feel like I need to paint some level of detail—more than I want—because I haven't painted enough of them to know how to capture their form in a loose fashion. The last thing I wanted to do was try to make this look photographic, and I'm happy it doesn't, but I am trying to paint flowers that are detailed enough to be recognizable, because I'm a gardener and a plant lover. (For you other gardeners, there are alstromerias, astrantias, barberry, corydalis, and one allium.)

What I did here was put in the background foliage first, getting both the shape and the overall dark-light and color pattern of the gentle curves down before I even thought about where the flowers would go. I felt like the background established the structure, and that structure was really the most important element of the painting. I still remember this planting as incredibly dense, dozens of different plants crammed together and foliage so thick you couldn't poke a stick through it, and I wanted to get that overabundance in the painting.

When it came to painting the flowers, I quickly discovered that my reference photo wasn't sharp enough to be able to make out the separate flowers in the big clumps of alstromerias, and in the end I didn't even try. I settled for working up only the bottom two clumps as realistically as I could, and capturing just a rough color pattern of the rest of the alstromerias.

The purple astrantias were just as difficult because they're so textured, such fuzzy little puffballs, in all shades of dark red violet to near-white. Again, if I wanted them to be identifiable, I had to make them somewhat detailed.

The lesson for me was, the first time you paint something, it's very much a learning process. I wasn't painting the flowers so much as trying to figure out how to paint the flowers, and this painting is the result.

The paintings that don't kill us make us...

Rain Clouds Over Mt. Hood

...frustrated? humble? or just more stubborn?

This painting started out as a formidable adversary, and never let up till the last brush stroke. Which may be partly because I had a really clear vision of how I wanted it to look. I wanted the perfect combination of blue-violet and yellow-orange—tertiary colors, and complements—and I wanted Mt. Hood to look as massive and impressive as it feels when you see it, despite its distance and the more overwhelming drama of the thick, dark rain clouds.

It didn't help that for the more than two months it sat on my easel I was never able to give it more than one or two sessions a week, and some weeks, nothing. It's been so long since I started it that I don't even remember all the problems I ran into, but I do know the two biggest were giving sufficient detail to the bluffs and getting the colors balanced to give me the harmony and mood I wanted.

I really hope it's true that the more you struggle with obstacles, the more you learn in the process. But I guess if this demonstrated again that the key to success of any kind is to not quit till you're happy, then that's lesson enough for me. Never give up! Never surrender!

A wonderful summer evening

I wanted to share this picture I took Saturday evening at the paintout at Villa Catalana Cellars. There was lovely live acoustic guitar music by great musicians, a colorful sunset with drifting clouds and a light breeze, and lots of happy people enjoying the food, wine, art, and wonderful weather.

If you're an artist interested in participating, contact Burl & Cindy Mostel at Villa Catalana Cellars.

PS. I made some progress on my painting but forgot to take any red, so I just worked on the foliage. Next time!

Paintout time again!

It's the annual Art In The Garden party at Villa Catalana Cellars in Oregon City this evening, and I can't believe the weather is this cool! Tickets are still available at their events webpage. Lots of food, wine, artists, and art! I'll be there working on a new painting and bringing along several of my previous paintings of their beautiful gardens and winery.

I'll be trying to turn this value sketch into a real painting:

Maybe I'll remember to bring the right colors this year!

Gettin' corny

I was visiting my friends in the gorge last week, and they hosted a group of plein air painters while I was there. Fortunately I had brought my gouache paints and stuff. The others were mostly hanging out on the bluff over the river, but I picked out a well-shaded spot, out of the strong wind gusts, that just happened to be next to their corn patch. I like gouache; it's easy to paint with, and like acrylics can look very much like watercolor, but can also be opaque. On hot and/or windy days it's way easier than trying to keep acrylics moist.

Wrapping it all up

I spent most of the last week working over the rocks,  a day on the grasses and minimizing the outlines of the columns, then two more on the sky and the tree. I'm happy with the overall dark-light pattern of the loose rocks and how it angles up and to the right, curving slightly around this end of the butte.

The most interesting thing that happened was a disagreement between me and the bottom left corner of the sky. I wanted it to be dark clouds, to match the upper right, but overnight I realized that made the whole left side look as heavy as the right, and dragged down the energy of the whole painting. The next idea I had was to turn those clouds into lighter, more bluish shadows—but as I worked on those, the whole small area turned itself into light sky instead. As soon as that happened, it made the white clouds look even brighter, punched up the green of the grasses, and for some reason made the face of the columns stand out more, both in brighter values and also in a dimensional sense.

I was so taken with that brightening effect that I invoked my artist's license to delete the bare tree growing out of the butte face on the left side (sketched in, in previous versions) so it wouldn't detract from the vertical lines of the butte. My excuse is that 100 years ago, that tree would not have been there, but the butte and the rocks, and probably the grasses too, would have looked the same as they do now.

And I got just the spring color combination I wanted!

Day, night, and textured gesso

This was a study for a larger painting of Horsethief Butte. I wanted to try painting on textured gesso so I first coated the canvas panel with a thick-enough layer of gesso and then used a stiff dish-scrubbing brush to create an uneven vertical texture on all of it. The side effect of that was getting tiny gesso splatters on everything on either side of the panel, including the shirt and vest I was wearing. The splatters came off pretty easily while they were still sort of soft.

I started out with a daylight painting, copying the colors and lighting from a photograph, and found a real problem with the texture—how hard it was to get color down in the cracks. I had imagined that I might get a watercolor-like effect with the white undercoat, but the only place I liked it was in the sky.

I stared at it for a couple days until I decided I really wanted to do a night scene like I'd been seeing in my mind. I was about to paint the whole thing over with near-black paint and start again, but at the last minute decided instead to just wash the land with black and deepen the blue of the sky. The dark wash had the instant effect of turning it into a night scene, dimming down all the values proportionately. Happily, it also filled in all the white cracks.

I needed, however, to lighten up the foreground hills and brush, and add some highlights on the high cliffs. I found that the heavy texture made any fine detail impossible, but helped create a suggestion of grasses in some places. I do plan to put on a gloss gel finish, and I have no idea if that's going to work. Even without the gloss, my mostly overhead lights reflect strongly off the texture.

While I was working on this study I was also preparing the canvas for the larger painting, and used the same texturing process on it. After struggling with the texture in the study, however, I went back with more gesso and all but obliterated the texture, leaving just a faint trace of it. I didn't really like working with it, or find it that interesting as a part of this painting. if you're not looking for that specific effect, it just adds difficulty. On the other hand, if you'd like to cut down the amount of detail you default to, this could help you in that direction.

Figuring out what the painting wants

I finally got the color I want on the last big hill. It took me three tries over three days. My first guess was too dark and I thought it was too blue. The second time I made it lighter and more gray, and that looked good value-wise, but the color just looked like it didn't fit. I puzzled over it last night, and finally decided to take it back to blue, but a warmer blue, almost matching the rear hill on the left side, so mostly pthalo, with a smaller fraction of cobalt. The other thing I did with this pass was reduce the range of values, giving it more aerial perspective by lowering contrast.

I think the reason it took me so long to get a color that looked good was, again, because I'm really inventing these colors—they only resemble the colors in the photo references I have; and those photos, which were taken in different seasons even, as well as different times of day, are all different from each other. It was too big of a leap for my brain to consolidate all that varied information in one pass—I had to circle around it for a while before I realized I was trying too hard to copy the colors from the photos instead of doing what the painting needs. Last night after I finally marked up a photo with these colors, I saw the symmetry I got by having the rear hills on both sides being almost the same hues.

The white lines are there because you can't cover up blue with Pyrole Orange without a LOT of impasto.

If I still like it tomorrow, then I'm done with the hills. Or mostly done. 😊

Almost 92º outside at 3:30pm. At least we had a nice cool night last night.

Working out the level of detail

I think the left-most (north side) hills are 95% done. Earlier in the week I started painting in the deciduous trees at the base of the middle hill, and took it to a level of detail that really seemed too much for the rest of the painting. I was afraid the overall scene would get lost in that much detail. I know that's the opposite of my main worry when I started (would there be enough detail to be interesting), but there you go. Anyway, I simplified it and darkened it, and I'm stopping work on that section for now. I may refine it more later...or not. I may end up wanting to put a lot more drama in the clouds.

Last night I roughed in the foreground across all three panels, so today I'm starting the 2nd pass on the south side hills. Only five weeks left to finish it!

Connecting the audience to the painting

The Upper Pond

My plan was to get this Upper Pond painting all done except for the highlights before the Villa Catalana Cellars Paint-Out last Saturday, and then work on those outside at the Villa, with the sun sinking in the west and all the people walking around and shmoozing. It was a great plan, and I got there at 4:30, an hour before the public came in. It was about 80º—better than I hoped, even—and I carted all my equipment and paintings up to a shady spot at the top of the hill where more people walk around. But when I set up my long-unused French easel, I found I had forgotten to bring my white paint. I walked around to the other painters to see if I could buy or borrow a dollop of white, but they were all either oil or pastel artists. I did a bit of glazing on a few places, but I really needed the white to do any real work. D'oh! It's a line item in my packing list now.

So I leaned back in my chair, listened to the band, and just pretended it was a forced vacation, and the only thing I could do was relax. In a little while people started walking around, and a few times an hour someone would come over and talk for a minute.

I did have a great time, despite not being able to paint there. I finished it up yesterday in the studio, thinking about the things people had said to me about it. Almost everyone who commented on this one of the upper pond with the property and the cabana behind it, said they loved the blue. One teenage girl said it was her favorite painting there, and that I "got the blue perfectly". I found that interesting because I had deliberately intensified the blue of the water and the sky, using pure Ultramarine blue with white to lighten it. The actual colors of the water and sky that day weren't anything like a match for my painting, they were both a warm azure blue, part cobalt and part cyan. So I think what she meant was that it matched something in her memories or her imagination. I was fine with painting the plants and the cabana their natural colors, and the same for the mimosa tree, but I really wanted the blue and yellow to go beyond what anyone would call natural.

Maybe the way to use color to connect to people is to connect to their imaginations, not to the natural colors of the landscape.

No more small paintings till after I get A Bigger Gorge finished, but this was a really useful exercise.

Art In The Garden at Villa Catalana Cellars this Saturday

The Lower Pond

Once again—fingers crossed that the temperature doesn't jump back up again—I'll be at the Paint-Out at Villa Catalana Cellars this Saturday from 5:30 to 9pm. I've suspended work on A Bigger Gorge to work up a couple paintings to bring—this one, which is almost finished, and hopefully another one that won't be so far along. I expect there'll be another dozen or more other artists there as well. You'll be able to purchase food and wine, and art if you like. If you'd like to go, you can find out more and make your reservation here.

Discovering a new love of painting

I'm trying to figure out why I'm enjoying working big so much. I've noticed that I'm not worrying about the outcome anywhere near as much as I used to. I think the sketching helped with that, but it also occurs to me that having to work with something so much bigger than I am, where I can only fit a small portion of it at a time in my field of view, maybe I have to trust that what I'm doing is going to fit in.

It's only about 30% done, time-wise, but it's going in the right direction. I've got almost all the shapes defined. I just want a little more shape definition on the north side (left side.)

I think there's something else going on that may be more personal—probably everyone wouldn't feel this way, but when I load up my big brush and step up to the canvas and apply the paint with a big stroke, it just feels like the most natural thing on earth. It feels like I've been doing it for centuries, and I'll keep doing it as long as I possibly can. It's not like I'm any good at it yet—I'm still doing a lot of repainting. But it feels like I've finally—finally—found something that totally belongs to me, and it's not a thing—it's a movement, it's a dance with color and form. It's even better than having a really good gardening day. It's like being myself in the most clear and unfettered way I know.

I love how it fills my visual space with color while I'm working on it—I really do like being surrounded by colors. But now that it's looking more like actual landforms, it's almost like looking out a big picture window at something 'real'. Glazing over this underpainting is what I'll be doing for the next several weeks.

Almost to the fun part

I've been making slow progress on the painting, and have almost finished the underpainting. After getting the more detailed photos I wanted, I'm tweaking the shapes of the bluffs on both sides of the river—and taking a lot more time than I thought I would need to do it. But I've started putting in some shape details and playing with colors a little on both the land and the clouds, which is fun doing this big.

I finally rearranged the easel setup so I can see the tv in my studio while I paint. I'm so used to watching dvds or streaming while I'm painting, I was really missing it.

It's going to be really hot here for the next week and a half, to hot to do anything outside besides water, so I should get a lot done.

I need more paint

Three and a half days of work later, I'm still working on the underpainting. I emptied another partial tube of paint—my cobalt green. I had just placed another order with Blick two days before, so I had to switch to a different green, permanent green light, and adjust the mix appropriately so it's good enough for now. I really underestimated how much additional paint I would need for this. And this is just the underpainting! Who knows how much more I'll need for the glazing!

Other than that, it's going well. I'm getting more detailed photos of the hills to work with, and once those get drawn in, I'll be able to start playing with more hues and layers of glazing.

I would say at this point that being able to work across two canvases at once is pretty much a requirement, for efficiency if nothing else, and especially when you have a design that requires continuity of line across those seams.

The whole three yards

I was sitting in the living room staring unconsciously at my sofa when I realized that its length and poufy cushion makes it possible for me line up the canvases out here so I can see them all together, and from more than three feet away. The only way I can see them lined up in the studio is to stand to one side and use a fresnel lens:

Obviously not a great solution.

So! On we go. For the first two days I couldn't help spending time saying to myself, "What was I thinking?", even as it was taking shape. I would stand looking at just two panels together and think, that is huge! But being right up there next to it, with those intense colors filling my field of view, mixing big globs of paint and brushing it on with large, bold strokes—it feels great!

I have to take my 40% coupon to Michael's this morning and get more purple and diarylide yellow paint, but right now I'm just excited to see it all together. And, very, very happy that I can see it all together.

Making room for a big canvas

The first day of work on the painting I put each canvas up on my regular easel one at a time and blocked in the top band of purple. When I finished that and lined them up, I saw that even with the drawing, there was a big difference on the sides of the #1-#2 seam. I knew then that I really needed to work on two at a time.

So today I moved my regular easel out to the garage and brought the rack back in, and set it up in the studio in the only place there's room. I set up a table on either side, and used the counter behind me to hold everything else.

Once I got a workable setup and started putting on the paint, it became fun. I'm really going through paint as I block in the basic shapes. I wish I could put all three up, but there just isn't enough room, in my 13'x15' converted-garage hobby room/studio.

A Bigger Gorge

I'm following in the steps of David Hockney and Robert Burridge and taking on my first ever multiple-canvas painting—and it's a big one. A triptych 4' high by 9' wide—three 36x48 canvases. I've done singles that size, even a 36x60 once, but this is a whole new level of largeness for me. It's going to make this studio feel pretty small, I'm thinking.

The design that my client chose is my little gorge sunrise sketch I did in May:

Since the design has so many lines that continue across two of the canvases, I have to have some way to line up at least two at a time for the drawing, the color matching, and the finishing touches—hmmm, that's about 80% of the painting time—so I'll be pressing my folding show rack into service. I was very happy to find out that it's plenty big enough to hold two.

I'll be blogging this all the way to its hang-up in a North Portland office building! I'm guessing it'll take me 2-3 months to finish. I think the biggest challenge is going to be to create enough texture and color detail to make it interesting at that size when the design is so simple. That may not be a problem at all, but it's the thing I'm most concerned about right now. Well, that and getting around in my studio while it's in here. I had to do some clean-up, some clear-out, and move one chair out to the garage,  but that's not bad. I've always wanted to paint big, so here's my chance to find out if I do like it!

And when I'm done, it'll be Autumn!

A June flower patch

Flower Patch

I came back from an artist friend's house with a nice photo of one of her flower patches. I was looking for another quick flower sketch to frame for my weekend show in ten days, and I decided to try this one. The afternoon light from the top left helped define both the masses and the individual plants.

I blocked in the background and foliage colors first. After that I started brushing in details of the different foliage types and colors. When I had their shapes in, I blocked in the dark shades of the flowers. Because of the darker background, it took several layers of paint to build up the lighter colors.

The many different foliage shapes and textures required a few different brushes and more detail than I've been doing, but those different shapes and hues are the substance of this painting, and I was hoping to make a few of the plants recognizable to gardeners—feverfew, foxglove, roses and California poppies. The mop in the upper left is supposed to be asparagus.

I was surprised by the amount of depth that appeared; maybe it's from the darker-than-necessary shadows in the background.

184 Lewisias...give or take a few

Lewisia

I was taking photos of my neighbor's heirloom bearded irises and this Lewisia cotyledon caught my eye on my way out of her yard. I know this lewisia personally because I was with my neighbor when she bought it, at Wild Ginger Farm in Beavercreek, maybe 6 years ago? I had my doubts then that it would survive outside—ignorance on my part—but it has obviously thrived in bright, filtered light and everything the weather has thrown at it. I took a quick photo of it, and decided later that it would get painted before the irises. I knew what I was getting into but wanted to try anyway.

I figured patience would make or break the painting, and started out with a charcoal drawing, settling on clumps of flowers, and cutting down to about 160 flowers to start with, from the maybe 250 in the photograph. I found first that there were hues of orange, red, yellow, magenta, and deep red-violet in the flowers, and greens that ranged from light yellow-green to deep emerald and turquoise-green. I started by blocking in the flowers in shades of peach as a base, knowing it would take many, many layers to capture all the colors. I had no plans to paint every petal on every flower, and saved that for a sprinkling of large ones around the upper right where the brightest were. Everybody else got just a suggestion of their many hues. There was not one flower that showed only one hue.

As soon as I started working on the leaves, I knew I wanted a live model, so I called Wild Ginger and asked if I could come pick one up. I wanted to get a good sense of the thickness and curves of the leaves and how they reflect the light—they were too much obscured in the photo for me to get a good feel for them—and also I was by then insanely jealous of my neighbor's success and had to try growing one—no, two—of my own. I don't care if I have to wait six years, I want one like this!

After that I alternated a day on the flowers, then a day on the leaves, building up layers of hues and picking what to emphasize and what to dress down, trying to build a center of focus in the upper right. Yesterday, after six days, it was ready to start the finishing touches, when I realized I needed to darken and violet-ize everything on the left side, but my glaze was too thick and they all went from semi-defined flowers to undifferentiated blobs. ARGHHH! Fortunately I still had all my different hue mixes and it only took a couple hours to repaint them all. Some dark blue-violets in the darkest shadows made the highlights pop, and the yellow centers in every open flower made them look more defined than they are. The orange hue in the cement surface in the lower right woke up the turquoise upper left and helped fill out the color scheme.