New Spring Foliage Last Light 11″x14″ Oil on Canvas Panel
I was on the Pitt River quite late for this one and this was my second that session. I had to work fast to get this, trying to capture the streaming light before the sun went down. Also the blossom tree was quite captivating I suspect it is already dropped it’s blossoms so I’m glad I caught it. This was done a week ago today.
Lost Logs & Deadfall 11″x14″ Oil on Canvas Panel
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Tide’s Out on the Pitt River 11″x14″ Oil on Canvas Panel
The Pitt River has a fresh water source and comes down into the Fraser which then goes to the Straight of Georgia which is salt water and where the tides come from. It would never be too deep for me here on the Pitt but I still don’t like to get wet feet as I often only have running shoes on. I have been going down off the dike to paint at the edge of the river for a better view and the other night I found my little path back filled with incoming tide. I had to find another way round. Always an adventure on this river lots of birds, eagles, herons and ducks of all sorts.
Pitt River Early Spring 11″x14″ Oil on Canvas Panel
I painted this a couple of weeks ago and will start to add pieces I’ve been working on this spring as I have a few now that I like. I don’t get keepers very often when I go out but I’ve been working towards a show for the end of this year and I’m using these for painting larger pieces. I’ve not found it easy to go larger either but have a few now that I think will work for the show. This is 11″x14″ and I’m hoping to start taking larger canvases outdoors also. By selecting the above image it will link you to my Daily Paintworks auction.
I posted yesterday my effort from the Opus Outdoor Painting Challenge on Saturday that I was on in Langley BC and my good friend Michael King wrote a nice entertaining article on his plein air web site which captured the day nicely for me. Here is the link to the article Plein Air BC .
I’ve just been home from the second annual outdoor painting challenge that Opus Art Supplies put on and had a great time despite the weather. I decided to see if I could paint a bright cheery painting as the day started out with showers and as I painted I had rain pooling on my palette. Except for that I managed to stay fairly dry and comfortable and challenged myself to paint for only 1.5 hours which I managed with time to spare. I thought this was somewhat successful venture but alas didn’t win any acclaim once again.
Garden Path With Rhodos 8″x10″ Oil on Canvas Panel
Last Light 8″x8″ Oil on Stretched Canvas
I’ve been trying to do some cloud studies in the last couple of weeks as an assignment but since the weather has not been cooperating I managed to get a photo of this spectacular cloud with the last light hitting it. I have much more work to do on clouds. I guess I’ve avoided painting them in the past as I found this to be a challenge.
Mount Baker in the Background 11″x14″ Oil on Canvas Panel
I have been very neglectful of my blog and website in the last several months and I apologize to all. I have been trying to go back to basics and learn to paint a better painting. This was my latest plein air piece. I gave myself some new equipment and tried it out on the 1st of this new year. What fun! Although I may try and rework this a bit at home I felt it was getting closer to the kind of painting I wanted to be doing.
I was thinking the small pieces I was working on last year got too tight and lacked something for me in the process. I was most unhappy with myself after much effort through the summer so I went and asked for a review of my work from someone I trusted to give me a good idea of where I was going wrong. As painful as that process was I will try and keep on track to improve daily. As I try to study and rework how I’ve been painting I hope this new work will delight more then me but as I learn I will probably get worse again. I understand this is the process. I think I’ll just try and have more fun this year and try not to please you my new friends but delight in the process. Working to sell is not what my next year will be about and I want to start writing more of the things I’m learning as I go.
I’ve got a show in a year from now and I will try and produce finished work for it. These will be more labored no doubt. The process which I hope will transpire with these are that I will start with the outdoor pieces enlarge the design and carry the larger studio starts back out to the spot of the initial conception. This was a process that was used by an artist that I recently discovered and liked her work. It had the right amount of designing in it with that feel of outdoor spontaneity. So far I can not seem to design what I think I want when I go out to paint. It’s as if my brain flies away when it has the space to soar. The pieces need to be reworked when I get home or they are just not working at all. Having said all that the above piece had a first idea of z pattern going through so that much I held on to. I had started an hour before sunset and the temperature plummeted with the sun going down my hands froze just before I could finished and I have now remedied that little problem.
My show will also be related to the city I live in, it is our centennial year. The middle ground of this scene is called Mary Hill which a hundred years ago was probably all bush and today it is covered over in townhouses. The land in the foreground is part of the regional park and is also a bird sanctuary one of my favorite places to go walking and painting. I was on top of the hill that overlooks my city and has a great vista which over looks the whole of Port Coquitlam. The town homes were all lit up with the setting sunlight and made the value higher then I think it should have been painted. This is what my what my next posts will be about as I’m trying to get my head wrapped around landscape values. I think there are some definite issues with values on this my first effort on this location.
Till then I wish you all A Happy New Year.
Flowers in a Mason Jar 5″x7″ Oil on Board
These flowers were the last of my farmers market bouquets. The sunflowers were finished after this day of painting them.
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Sunflowers, Milk Bottle and Red Onion 5″x7″ Oil on Board
This piece has just gone up on my auction. These were sunflowers from the farmers market a couple of weeks ago now.
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Cherries and 30″s Jadite Sugar Shaker 6″x6″ Oil on Board
This was done about a month ago just at the end of cherry season. Also thought the 30’s Jeannette Jadite Sugar Shaker would make a nice complement to this still life setup.
This is also going to my auction tomorrow.
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Denise Maxwell's Gallery 