Landscape

Although where I live is very suburban, less than 2 miles away is an area of gilbert that still has some rural flavor. 

Sonoma Plein Air

On a whim, I applied to be a participating artist in the Sonoma Plein Air Painting event. This past week I received notification that I have been accepted. So in September I will be in beautiful Sonoma County painting away. I don't know too much about it and have never done one of these events before. However, I was just reading Terry Miura's account of his experience a few years ago which makes it sound pretty good. As a result of this, I will be doing as much plein air painting as I can over the next months. Here are a couple I've done this week.

This first one, I tried something compositionally that didn't work out so well; the placement of the post in the center. However, I do like the sense of light and atmosphere.

 This second one is some silos in the early morning, not far from my house.

More Utah

Farmhouse in Utah

Working in a palette of purple, green and a little blue, red-orange. 

Another Head Study

Ink Studies, Siguenza Spain and Heber Utah

I'm wanting to take a break from the city work I've been doing. Just for awhile.b So here are some ink studies I've been doing to explore some ideas for paintings. In these studies, I am trying to break the composition down to about 3 or 4 main values.
These first 2 are based on sketches and photos from a trip to Spain a few years ago.

In the mountains of Utah is the Heber Valley. My Mom was born there and then grew up not far away in the then mining town of Park City. We visited there every summer of my childhood. We now have a cabin in the same vicinity, thanks to my wife's family, so we continue to spend a week or 2 there every summer. For years I have thought, I need to paint this place. I'm finally going to start. This again is based on a photo from some time ago.

60 Minute Head

Another of my efforts to regain my head painting abilities. It wasn't really only 60 minutes. I did the first pass in 1 hour and then did a little work on the shadow side of the face. You can see how it is not as broadly painted as the shadow. I started with a palette knife, laying in large shapes of color and then refined it a little with brushes. The first lay-in was pretty good but a couple days later, I realized the shadows were not dark enough. That was when I got back into the painting and fussed around a little too much with the forms in the shadows. Nonetheless, I'm reasonably pleased with the outcome.