Step by Step Landscape in Acrylic - August Afternoon

My main genre is still life, however I really enjoy mixing in a landscape or an architectural painting, just to loosen up a bit. This image is the entrance to the old farm on Hornby Island, British Columbia. It's a beautiful spot. Every time I visit Hornby I photograph the entrance to the farm. There's something so peaceful about it, and the road leading in makes me want to follow it.

I started by cropping the image for compositional purposes. I wanted the two trees to fall at the 'law of thirds' intersection. For those of you who may not know, if you divide your canvas into thirds horizontally and vertically, the intersection of the lines in four places, offer good locations to position the focal point.

Using Transparent Red Iron Oxide, I warmly coloured the ground on the canvas, and to blocked in the basic shapes. A warm red tone is a nice counterbalance to the greens in the trees. 

I started to block in the colour in each shape and to develop the foreground a bit. The darker shade area in the foreground and the light of the sky, helped to gauge the values of the rest of the painting.

I continued developing the painting adding a bit more red tone with burnt sienna mixed with some napthol red, creating branches in the trees. I removed the barn because it was distracting from the focal point.

I broke up the solid tree branch shapes with more variety in value and colour,  strengthened the colour of the sky, and cooled down and lightened the background trees so they moved back in space. The foreground was developed a bit more as well. I used acrylic medium to blend the grass shapes and added some more darks.

The name chosen for this painting is August Afternoon, and I felt the colour of the field wasn't reflecting the impression of a hot summer afternoon. I used glazing fluid and glazed a warm golden colour of hanza yellow deep broken with a bit of ultramarine and alizarin crimson. I added some grass in the field, and developed some lights in the trees to finish it off. 

On a hot August afternoon the entrance to the farm is so still and peaceful. You can hear a few crickets and the breeze moving the branches and it's all about sun and shade. Truly idyllic.

August Afternoon   16 x 16  Acrylic  $650

Step by Step Landscape in Acrylic - August Afternoon

Sunnyside Up

Oil on Canvas 9 x 12 SOLD

Keeping with the sunshine theme of summer, I'm reposting a painting that gave me an equally sunny, happy feeling as my last post. I haven't posted much this summer, as we've been very busy with family visiting for one month from France, going in and out of town with them, and each time we returned I had an all day painting event. We even threw in my mom's wonderful 91st birthday celebration! It's been a bit crazy but lots of fun, and definitely great spending time with family. I'm looking forward to getting back to painting regularly, posting regularly and reconnecting with a lot of my blogging buddies. Even Facebook and Twitter are sending me messages about my absence. (It feels kind of good to be unplugged for a while) Enjoy the rest of your summer!

Sunnyside Up

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

Cedar Stroll

Oil on Linen 20 x 16

I love walking in the forests of BC. The Red and Yellow Cedars are spectacular, and when you find some old growth, the diameter of the tree trunks is astounding. This scene is from Lighthouse Park in West Vancouver. The dappled sunlight breaking through the canopy of trees was something I just had to paint.

Cedar Stroll

Seascape Still in Progress

I've continued moving down the canvas, blocking in the colour, and making bold energetic strokes with either large brushes or a palette knife. The coarse pumice medium is really interesting because it has a very 3D effect, and obviously lends itself to the beach scene. The paint on the pumice is drying about 3 tones darker than the same colour on the bare canvas, which actually makes some interesting marks. It's really hard to cover the pumice because there are many little holes where the pigment isn't penetrating. I'm having to use a hard bristle brush and scrub the pigment into the holes because those areas are looking under painted. In some applications, the areas left unpainted could have a nice effect, but in this instance it's not working. If I use this medium again I'll  most likely add pigment to the medium before applying it.

 

I have all the colour blocking in place now and can begin adding shadows to start forming the beachscape, which is made up of sandstone formations, rocks and seaweed. I need to darken down the foreground but also create a warm glow anywhere the light hits small pools of water.

This is my second to last painting session on this piece. I now have the beach well formed, but will need to darken the foreground and warm it up. I also want to work on the sky creating a bit more drama. I won't be able to photograph the final painting until the weekend. There's just not enough light by the time I get home from work. In any case, I'm having a lot of fun with this, and it's great to experiment with different mediums. On the final post for this painting I'll try to include some details so you can get an idea of the texture. I hope you're enjoying this experimental journey with me.

Seascape Still in Progress

Morning Calm

Original Acrylic on Canvas  16 x 20  Framed $450

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This is a scene from Saltspring Island. I was up early and photographed this peaceful scene with the little fishing boat tied up. I loved the light on the boat and the diagonal line formed by the current in the water, leading in a curve toward the boat. I had to lighten the background mountains a few times to push them back sufficiently. The foreground shadows were formed by a tree and I considered putting in a piece of branch to explain the shadow, but decided it would be too distracting. Does anyone have any thoughts on that? I could still put it in.

Morning Calm

The Boat Garage

Original Oil on Canvas  8 x 8 $150 Free shipping CAN & US
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Here's another scene from Hornby Island, although this time it's a house for boats instead of people. I've been rereading selected segments of Carlson's Guide to Landscape Painting, and trying to apply his techniques to my painting style. Changing your approach to painting is one of the hardest things to do, but I've been focusing on this while painting this series of beach houses. I have found that with each painting the application of his suggestions has become easier. I started by choosing just one suggestion, worked on that, then the next time I worked on the same thing, but added another suggestion to the mix. Here are the points I've been focusing on. 

• Note the artistic intention - what is drawing you to this image? Decide what to feature and how best to do that.
• Squint your eyes and block in tonal values of light and dark with poster-like flatness, covering all of the canvas.
• Introduce modeling into all the flat values.
• Look for and feel the landscape sense - the artistic expression, the rhythmic reach of the trees.

I feel that I've learned so much from purposely considering each of these steps,  while painting these small beach scenes and I'm totally excited about it. Although these are steps that I use to some extent regularly when I paint, by really giving them consideration, it clarified my values and  improved the expression of my brushstrokes.  If you can get a copy of his book (lots of used ones online), I would highly recommend it.

 

The Boat Garage

A Room With a View

Original Oil on Canvas  8 x 8  $150 Free Shipping CAN & US
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Here's another beach house from Hornby Island. I just love this one. I'd be quite happy to move right in. The window gives you a fantastic view of Whaling Station Bay, a beautiful big, white sand beach with water warm enough to swim in the summer. We've spent some wonderful summer afternoons on this beach. It's hard to believe that it's the Pacific Northwest. 

 

A Room With a View

Beach House III - Under Cover

Original Oil Painting   9 x 12   



Another beach house scene from Hornby Island. This was painted from a picture taken on a walk along Whaling Station Bay. I loved the beach grass forming a path to the house, and the light play coming through the thick cover of trees. It seemed nestled in and cozy under the firs and arbutus trees. There was an awful lot of green in this painting. I find green a challenging colour. For me it's difficult to get just the right hue and temperature. So I really stretched myself on this one. I experimented with a variety of yellows and blues, scaping off my palette many times, before arriving at the colours I chose to paint with. I think the final result captures the light and feel of the place.

 

Beach House III - Under Cover

Beach House II - Sunny Side Up

Original Oil Painting 8 x10 SOLD

This is another little beach house from Hornby Island. I just loved the colours of the house in the sunshine, and Sunny Side Up immediately came to mind. I substituted an arbutus tree for the evergreen that was there to add a bit more red, and more island charm to the painting.

Beach House II - Sunny Side Up

Beach House

Original Oil on Panel - Plein Air  8 x 10  $100 Free shipping

We recently returned from a heavenly week at my favourite west coast getaway spot - Hornby Island. This is one of the most fabulous places to holiday in the summer. It has gorgeous white sand beaches and WARM water, which is almost unheard of in the Pacific Northwest! It also has gorgeous scenery, spectacular bluffs with fields of tall grass and wild flowers at the top, and more bald eagles than you can imagine. This is a cute little house on Little Tribune Bay. I took the liberty of playing with the house colours a bit. There were a lot of different greens layering back, and some really dark darks, inside the foliage around the house. I tried to simplify without losing too much of the effect. At the end of the painting session, I stood back and decided that there was too much definition in the foliage, so it was competing with the house. I took a fan brush and lightly but boldly stroked over the foliage, in the same swooping manner that the branches grew, and liked the effect much better. The foliage maintained it's character, the house, the center of interest, kept the more defined brushstrokes.

 

Beach House

Lighthouse Point

Original Oil on Panel 8 x 10 SOLD
I travel frequently between Victoria and Vancouver on BC Ferries. Luckily you pass through some of the most spectacular scenery on the west coast. This lighthouse out on the point with small broken islands all around, is one of my favourite scenes as we cross, so it's only fitting that I paint it! I have no idea what the name of the island is, but it's a really pretty spot.

Lighthouse Point

Island Living

Acrylic on Exhibition Canvas 20 x 16 SOLD

Here is a summer beach scene from Saltspring Island, one of several gorgeous Gulf Islands, between here and Vancouver. This is one of our favourite places for a quick getaway. Many of the beaches have rock shoals, as seen here, and feature beautiful Arbutus trees. Here's someone's little skiff, just waiting to go for a row and a cottage nestled in the trees in the distance. Of course I had to paint it! I'm pleased with the sparkling light that I managed to capture.

Island Living