Monhegan Island - Day 3

Day 3 was another beautiful day on Monhegan. The top painting is 8x10 from Little Whitehead looking toward Blackhead. I was on the edge of a cliff while painting this scene. I had the idea to repeat the shapes of the tree in front of me along with the shape of the coastline. At about 2 in the afternoon the updrafts started, which threatened to pull my umbrella inside out, so I had to close it up and paint in the strong sun.

The bottom painting is 6x8 looking toward Manana (The small  island adjacent to Monhegan). A storm was coming in and it got pretty exciting as the wind kicked up, the temperature dropped about 20 degrees, rain blowing in my face, lightening flashes in the distance, seagulls flocking and flying around me. Painting is cool.

Thought for the Day

"The energy conveyed in a quick sketch far outweighs accuracy...in my humble opinion.
Curious how more diligence can be less productive."

John Wright     

"It ain't sophisticated, but somehow it's exactly what sketching is supposed to be - fast, impressionistic and less than perfect."

Roger O'Reilly

Monhegan Island - Day 2

This is "Washer Woman" near Lobster Point. Oil on 8x10 panel. I thought the horizon line turned out nicely and I had fun abstracting the rocks in the foreground. Beautiful day.

Painting Class - July 20th and 22nd

This is a copy of a William Merritt Chase painting I did a couple of weeks ago. That Ron actually has a Chase painting is pretty cool and that he would bring it in to class for us to copy is beyond cool. I'm not that good at photographing these oil paintings but I think I actually like the photograph better than the painting in this case! I probably shouldn't admit this but the colors are warmer and richer in the photograph and I like that. However, in my defense, my painting is much closer to the original. Anyway, I like the thick/thin contrast of paint and feel like I'm making good progress. This is on a stretched 18x24 canvas. I didn't measure the original but it was more like 22x40.

Monhegan Island - Day 1

Both of these paintings are small - 6x8 "studies" I will call them. I went to Colin Page's studio last night with a group of folks from my painting class and someone made the comment that "studies" are simply unsuccessful paintings. I thought that was funny/true.

These are my first paintings from Monhegan. We went to Fish Beach and set up our stuff and watched while Michael (Michael Vermette) did a painting demonstration with a palette knife and introduced us to Black Oil Wax medium. I did the top painting there and I was slipping and sliding all over the place using that knife. What a mess. Oh, and I should point out that we only had 20 minutes to do these "studies"!

The bottom painting was done after dinner. I went down to Lobster Cove at sunset and tried to integrate some palette knife with brush. The cool thing about that painting was the experience of doing it. The wind was intense and blowing me all over the place. I couldn't make a straight line to save my life. This is a life ring on a post. They have these at various places on the island because the currents are so strong they can sweep you out to sea. The photo to the left I found on the web - taken by TR Smith. That's what it looked like in real life.

Painting Class - June 29 - July 8

I spent 3 sessions on this painting. I think it's the most "realistic" painting I've done. Really looking at color and value, shadows, highlights, etc. I worked on it for 2 sessions and was ready to move on to something else but Susan encouraged me to continue and push it a little further. I'm glad I continued to work on it.

Painting Class - June 15 and 17

Same subject, different view but this time the bowl and pitcher were on a white paper towel so it lessened the colors being reflected up on to them. I like the apple here.

Painting Class - June 8 and 10

It's been awhile since I posted anything from my painting class. This still life was fun to paint. Just shows how much color is in white!

Cathedral Woods

Just back from a week on Monhegan Island. This is my only watercolor sketch. The rest were all oil studies on either 6x8 or 8x10 canvas panels.

This was done in the Cathedral Woods. I loved doing this sketch as I was on familiar ground here - both physically and artistically. When Alex was 4, 5, and 6 we would come to the Cathedral Woods and build Fairy Houses. He loved it and I have good memories of doing that with him. And after a week of struggling with oils, I needed to do something I felt familiar with and for me, that is watercolor with pen.

I'll post some oils soon...

Bananas Farnsworth

Next week I'm heading off to Monhegan Island for a whole week of painting. A former watercolor instructor I had a few years ago is running a workshop called "The Race - Monhegan Studies". It's based on a story that Robert Henri (The Art Spirit) and a few other artist - George Bellows, Rockwell Kent, Leon Kroll, and Randell Davey - came to Monhegan in the early 1900's and made a gentleman's wager amongst themselves to see how many paintings they could do in a day in the weeks to come.They felt this was the best way to get acquainted with the island and experience as much of its uniqueness as possible in the short time they had. This became known as “THE RACE” and it created some of the most beautiful studies ever painted of Monhegan Island by these very same painters.

Now, I don't think I'm going to "race" but I hope to paint at some interesting locations and sharpen my plein air skills. See you in a couple of weeks!