Plein Air

This past weekend my painting buddy Sharon and I  managed to get in a bit of plein air painting by the seaside in Oak Bay. It was our first time out this season, and of course I forgot a few necessities, like my garden gloves that I use to paint. But the funniest was that I didn't have my usual paint colours, and I realized that I was using someone else's palette. I had brought a box of paints that had been suggested by an instructor for a workshop I took a while back.

 

This scene is just a few hundred yards from the Oak Bay Marina Coffee House, where I will be setting up my still life show tomorrow morning. It will be running the whole month of June, so if you live in the area and are out for a walk along the beach front, drop by for a coffee or bite to eat and enjoy the show! 

This is a Mexican inspired painting that will featured in the show. There will be 7 or 8 other Still Life paintings as well.

Plein Air

Symphony Splash at the Empress Hotel

Symphony Splash, Victoria's favourite summer festival, took place yesterday in Victoria's Inner Harbour. The Symphony and all of the other musical entertainment for the day, were on a barge in the bay, in front of the Empress Hotel and the Provincial Legislature Building. Festival goers from all of the world as well as most of Victoria, came out for this wonderful event. I was one of six artists demonstrating on the lawn of the Empress Hotel. These three girls from Japan were so beautiful in their kimonos!


I had a great time interacting with the public who are always so interested in an artist's process.
Some of the other activities included top class street entertainers, a street dance with lessons from the Arthur Murray Dance Company, painting for kids, and the best, a Musical Instrument Petting Zoo of kids, so they could hold and try out a musical instrument.


As the sun went down the anticipation to hear the Victoria Symphony play from the barge increased. More and more people arrived, more and more boats arrived, and the best seats were in kayaks right in front of the Symphony Barge. The kayakers were thick like rush hour traffic!


Our Provincial Legislature building with it's beautiful night time lights.



The Victoria Symphony, playing on their floating stage. They played many well known classical pieces, as well as some fun pieces by the Beatles that everyone sang along to.



As the final piece of music came to an end the sky lit up with a grand finale of fireworks! What a fantastic day everyone had, and I'm lucky enough to live here!

Symphony Splash at the Empress Hotel

Artishow Plein Air Event - Empress Hotel Victoria BC

This past Sunday was the Artishow Plein Air kick off event. Every Sunday throughout the summer, artists will be demonstrating their work at hotels around the Inner Harbour of Victoria. Painters and sculptors will be out interacting with the public, both locals and tourists. It was a great day, and I spoke to people from many parts of the world. I'm very honoured and humbled to be with some of Victoria's best artists at Artishow, plein air summer event. Check them out - Annie Pelletier, David Hunwick, David Goatly, Tara Juneau, and Robert Amos.





The painting I started on Sunday is a view from Cattle Point, a few blocks from my home, across to Mount Baker in Washington State. We can go weeks without seeing Mt. Baker because of cloud cover, but when we do, it's absolutely breathtaking. It just looms up and glows in the sun.

The canvas is 24 x 48, and did I mention that it's always windy in Victoria? We're right on the Pacific Ocean with nothing but wind and water between us and Japan. Luckily I brought bungy cords. I had my canvas attached to the easel with a bungy, and the easel attached to a box holding supplies and a heavy jug of water. I was painting in acrylics, and with each gust of wind, my paint dried at high speed. It made covering a large canvas a bit of challenge, but I got around it with acrylic medium and mixing the colour inside a yogurt container.





I'm posing for my girlfriend Kerry, who came down expressly to capture these photos for my blog. Thanks Kerry!




Chatting to some interested art enthusiasts, who just happen to be locals. We have a vibrant arts scene in Victoria and many dedicated show goers. I'm almost finished the painting, and will most likely post it in a few days. This upcoming long weekend, Sunday July 3rd, from 12 noon - 6pm, we will be out again on the lawn at the Empress Hotel. If you're in the area, we'd love to see you!

Artishow Plein Air Event - Empress Hotel Victoria BC

Shady Spot

My plein air painting buddies and I headed out to a nearby park the other morning. It's a beautiful spot with gorgeous scenes to paint in every direction, but finally we decided to paint this stand of Arbutus trees. We all love Arbutus trees for their beautiful red peeling bark and often wind twisted trunks. Unfortunately there is a disease striking these trees, and many of them are having to be removed. So in honour of these west coast beauties, we all started painting. A short time later, a photographer arrived and informed us that a wedding party would be arriving soon, and they would need the entire area. We promised we would leave, and started painting with great speed, trying to get down the necessary lights and darks. I think he misinterpreted our zealous painting, and thought we were going to be problem painters, because he kept coming back and giving us a countdown. We were gone before the first of the happy wedding party arrived and we all finished our paintings at home. I had trouble differentiating the tree foliage in the midground with the shrubs and trees in the background. We may just have to go back to that spot again, but never on a Saturday! :-)

Shady Spot

First Plein Air Painting Day of 2011

This is my first plein air painting of 2011. It's been a long year since I did this, and not only was I very rusty, but I'd forgotten just how challenging painting outdoors is. But first, what a beautiful day it was! My painting buddy Sharon Churchill and I headed to one of our favourite locations - Glencoe Cove. It was the first warm, sunny weekend since the end of September 2010!! If you live in the Pacific Northwest you know that I'm only joking a little bit. In any case we had a glorious day, and some wonderful visitors, and below are some photos of our afternoon.


This cat must belong to an artist. He was so friendly, rubbing up against our legs, then he stretched out on the rocks and watched us for a while.


We were painting away and suddenly this beautiful little deer, came walking down the beach. How great is that?


The deer left the beach, then suddenly she was right beside us, checking us out from between the wild flowers, but by the time I picked up my camera, she had started to walk off.



Sharon with her new plein air painting set up. This was the first day she used her new painting umbrella. (I was very envious).

Sharon's painting was far superiour to mine.....but then I didn't have an umbrella! :-)

Plein air painting really is difficult. But although my painting was seriously lame, I did have a wonderful day and am excited to get out there again.

Here are some things that I should have been thinking about, but was distracted by all the natural beauty.

• First off I needed to simplify the scene. In my desire to have a foreground, midground and background, I ended up with a bit too much going on.

• I had a real problem with values. I don't know if it was because it was so bright, but when I got home and looked at my painting, I had made everything too dark. So this lame painting has actually been touched up a bit. In Michael Albala's book Landscape Painting, he states that "Ultimately, judging values is not a matching exercise between subject and painting; it is a comparative exercise among the values within the painting itself."
• The light kept changing quickly, and I got drawn into changing the water over and over again, even though I know not to. I was sort of caught up in the moment and not really planning the painting all that well. Albala recommends that "plein air painters take their time. A painting that is incomplete but well thought out and organized is ultimately superior to something that is "finished" but rushed and unrealized. An unfinished painting can easily be completed indoors because it has a solid foundation." I think that's a very relevant comment. So for next time, I'll approach it in a more relaxed and thoughtful manner, simplify, plan my composition with simplicity in mind, and make a comparison of my values within the painting. And I'll try not to be so distracted by all that natural beauty!
  

First Plein Air Painting Day of 2011