Pear still life from painting class. Pears are one of my favorite subjects; colorful and sensuously shaped, it is hard to pick up an art magazine and not find at least one pear painting. These were done on a well used canvas: gessoed over and rubbed down with thinner several times until the surface looked like the wall of an Italian villa.
This, and the work from yesterday are on small gessoed panels. I have been going back to the black and white sketches (created from my photo scrap and drawn up at about 6"x8"using a Sharpie pen) that I used to put together my large studio pieces. The challenge is to seriously simplify the brushwork. Too much detail at this size, I think, defeats the whole purpose of going small. It is all about the design.
My view from the berm of the River on Saturday. I have painted this view many times and always find plenty to challenge me. Water can be hard to communicate but in the early morning, before the sun gets high, the light and dark shapes are quite clearly defined. I always try to hang on to those shapes by creating a black and white value sketch before starting to paint.
Carol Watson's painting from Saturday. We painted on the River, right off Riverwood Dr. It was a beautiful day: we met friends who were also out early and we saw deer come down to the river. After 2 hours we all left with pieces we were happy with.
