Class Schedule for Winter/Spring 2012

Evening Meadow

10 x 12

Available at Isherwood Gallery

Newport, RI

A new lineup of online classes is now posted for Winter/Spring 2012 including a new class- Composing the Landscape. Information and registration is here.

More Field Sketching

Lennox Woods Canopy

pen & ink/wash

6 1/4 x 9 1/2

This week in my online class Field Sketching for Landscape Painters we are using pen and ink and wash techniques. This has been a favorite sketching medium of artists for centuries and it is ideally suited for landscape work. Both Rembrandt and Corot used it to great effect and we've studied examples of their work as well as 19th century American artists like William Trost Richards.

This was done in an area called Lennox Woods, an old growth hardwood forest about 6 miles from us. It is one of the few remaining areas like this in the state and this one is particularly diverse given our location in the far northeastern corner of Texas. The Lennox family preserved it and gave about 300 acres to the Nature Conservancy. The forest is part of the Pecan Bayou watershed. I am working on a series of paintings inspired by Lennox Woods so I am over there a lot sketching.

I used a dip pen with a Hunt #512 nib, india ink and a small brush to apply the washes. The drawing is on Arches cold pressed watercolor paper. All images can be clicked for a larger view.

detail

detail

Field Sketching

We are in week 2 of my online class Field Sketching for Landscape Painters. The idea for this class came from two of my students who expressed concerns about their drawing skills and the challenges of working outdoors. One of the things I have noticed over the many years I have painted plein air and taught plein air painting is that most students are not really ready to take on the rigors of outdoor work. Most do not have the drawing skills, but those who do, fair much better. That combined with my interest in 19th century landscape painters and their working methods, led me to design a course which would give students some basic skills in drawing the landscape as an important prerequisite to painting it.

Our text for the class is John Ruskin's The Elements of Drawing which was so influential for American landscape painters in the 19th century. Combining Ruskin's drawing exercises with other assignments, students are building drawing skills for creating form, understanding value, and learning to slow down to appreciate and understand Nature as artist/naturalists. Here is some of their work.

Caroline Simmill, Moray, Scotland

Ash tree- Ruskin exercise
Caroline Simmill

Brian McGurgan, Astoria, NY

Ruskin exercise
Bea Lancton, Fredericksburg, TX

Ruskin exercise
Jamie Kirkland, Santa Fe, NM

Ruskin exercise
Jamie Kirkland

Jan Delipsey, Dallas, TX

copy of Wm. Trost Ruchards drawing
Phoebe Chidester, Clearwater, FL

Ruskin exercise
Phoebe Chidester

Kathie Wheeler
Viroqua, WI


Sara Lubinski
Brownsville, MN

Dawn

Dawn-Study
8 x 10

My infatuation with morning light continues. I have several larger pieces on the easel right now, but I actually did this little study before we left for Taos.

Ten Days in Taos

We got back home about a week ago and have feverishly been trying to get caught up and back down to earth (literally, from 9,000 ft to about 400!). It was an exciting trip with lots of wonderful interludes- seeing old friends at the PAPNM show, the workshop, meeting new friends, and visiting with family. As usual I failed miserably at taking enough photos. No photos of Steve's "gumbo night" party, Kyoko's tempura feast, and a dozen other things. But, here are a few.

first sunset

PAPNM awards ceremony

class photo

teaching

field sketching on the Rio Grande

visit to the Millicent Rodgers Museum & my work

family fun

last sunset

Moonlight

Salt Marsh Moon
10 x 12

Moonlight is really the subject of this little painting. Our eyes adjust to the darkness, peer into it, searching. The cool light envelops and softens the nighttime world, revealing and hiding it from us at the same time.

Fall Gallery Night in Ft. Worth

Meadow Moonrise
12 x 10
Sold

Tomorrow night, Saturday September 10, is the annual Fall Gallery Night event sponsored by the Ft Worth Art Dealers Association. I'll be showing some new work at Galerie Kornye West, conveniently located in the Cultural District. If you are in the Metro area, stop in to visit!

Morning Light

Morning Light

24 x 30

As readers of this blog know, I am drawn to transitional times of day as the subject of my landscape paintings. For the most part, the evening hours have been my favorite subject. I love those brief moments when the day surrenders to the night. Although I walk at all times of the day, evening walks have always been my favorite. For the last four months though, I've been walking around dawn each day. I have to say, this time has inspired a new appreciation for the morning twilight hour.

This painting is based on a field about a mile from our property. The foreground shadow is mysteriously transparent, something which doesn't really show very well in the photograph. I've included a couple of details. You can get a larger view by clicking on them.

I used many many glazes on the foreground, creating suggestions of form within the shadows by subtle shifts in value and temperature. The road was laid in with thin opaque paint and then glazed over with the foreground glazes to bring it together and keep the value relationships correct. The lightstruck areas were created with thicker, lighter opaque paint.




The trees were laid in with several layers of transparent paint, then form was created with passages of velaturas and glaze impasto passages. Dry paint was dragged over some areas, and in some places the underpainting was left undisturbed.



The sky was painted with several layers of opaque paint and scumbled heavily in some areas. Scumbles were pulled over the trees in the distance to create atmosphere and the illusion of distance.

Busy!

Late Afternoon Light
16 x 20

The last few weeks have been a busy time in the studio as I am working on several groups of paintings for a couple of different shows. The work for the group show in London and for Atlanta will be shipped next Tuesday and the others shortly after. This painting will go somewhere although I haven't quite decided where yet!

My Trees class has kept me busy as well, with my students doing some lovely work. I'm also getting ready for my Taos workshop, pulling together some teaching materials and images.

Perhaps the most exciting thing though is the seed of an idea for a new project which I'm not quite ready to talk about yet. Stay tuned!

Student Drawings

My online class Drawing & Painting Trees started last Friday. I am so pleased with the work the group is doing, so I wanted to share some of it with blog readers. In the first week, we are studying the concept of taper-the diminution in size from trunk to limb to branch to twig, as well as using Ruskin's Elements of Drawing to do some drawing exercises. Although students are encouraged to work from life, I have also posted many examples of 19th century drawings so that students can also make copies, a time honored way of learning. Students are using pencils and charcoal. This is just a small sample of the many drawings the group has produced over the last six days.

Judy Warner, Harvard, MA

Judy Warner, Harvard, MA
A Ruskin exercise

Tom Peterson, Canton CT

Deb Mason, Fredericksburg, TX
copy of a Jervis McEntee drawing


Sandra Daunt, New Ross, Ireland

Jamie Kirkland, Santa Fe, NM
Ruskin exercise

Jan DeLipsey
Dallas, TX

Julie Davis, Austin, TX
Ruskin exercise

Chris Chisholm, Tyngboro, MA
Copy of William Trost Richards drawing

Phoebe Chidester
Clearwater, FL

Rose Tanner, Banff, Canada



Anne Marie Propst, NC
Concord, NC

It's a life, not a job

The Simplest Thing
9 x 12
Available at Huff Harrington Fine Art, Atlanta

Yesterday I was sorting through a few things in the studio and came across a couple of things that had been pinned to a bulletin board in my studio in New Mexico. When I was packing for our move to Texas over four years ago, I carefully put them in a folder so I wouldn't lose them, and then, of course, didn't find them until yesterday. There is a favorite quote from Emerson and another from Emily Dickinson. And, this one from my friend and mentor, Hollis Williford (1940-2007). Hollis was many things- a prolific and passionate sculptor, painter, printmaker and draughtsman, an authority on the history, peoples and lore of the American West, and student of art history. He was also a generous and unstinting mentor. I am grateful every day for the things I learned from him and the support he gave me.


"Don't wait for inspiration. Attack your work with a club and let your perspiration speak instead of revelation. Learn to be a perpetual student with an open mind. Think of your work as a journey without a destination. It's a life, not a job. During your first thirty years as an artist you notice you begin to work smarter instead of harder. The mistakes and shortcomings don't happen as often, and the success ratio goes up. The depth of understanding that is such a part of the evolution of ability intensifies with time and you find simplicity in beauty. Emerging artists - develop a strong, consistent work ethic. Educate yourself by studying and discovering all the giants on whose shoulders you wish to stand. Make life as much of a first hand experience as possible, because it is the source of your inspiration and subjects. Your individuality will develop as a natural part of hard work and application; hang on to it for dear life, for it is all you have that is truly yours."

Hollis Williford

New Web Site

Over the last few weeks I have been working on a new web site, one that I'll be able to update myself and will eventually include some snazzy new things like video clips. It is up now, so click on over and take a look. I am still tweaking things and trying to figure out the mysteries of meta tags and descriptions. Let me know if you see anything that doesn't work. Feedback is welcome!

Autumn-Morning Mist

Autumn-Morning Mist
12 x 12

There was most definitely some wishful thinking going on in the studio when I painted this. Hard to imagine that fall will ever come, but I was able to conjure up this painting of those lovely autumn mists from memory.

In Morning Light

In Morning Light
12 x 10

It has been so blazing hot, I am leaving earlier and earlier for my morning walk these days. The upside is that I am enjoying all the earliest bits of light while there is some residual coolness (relatively speaking) in the air.

I have one spot left (now full ) in the Drawing and Painting Trees online class starting in a few weeks and a couple of spots left in Field Sketching for Landscape Painters which begins in late September.