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(If you follow this blog, you have seen the under-painting for this finished piece)
Last week we were driving back to our place from Prineville...the oldest town in this area, a real ranching community. The road back takes you through some beautiful, rugged ranch land. It is a less familiar way to approach Smith Rocks, which can be seen in the distance. Something about the light that day really captured me (could it be that winter is finally coming to a close?), and I just had to paint the scene before me. In the under painting I emphasized the color transition in the sky from horizon to the deep blue of the sky above. However, as I stepped back, I realized that I needed to break up the space with some subtle clouds...this painting is not about clouds, but about the vastness in my part of the world.

If you have followed this saga, you know that all the artists at Tumalo Art Co. in Bend agreed to represent in their own style, media, etc., one of the luscious photos taken by Bruce Jackson. I thought this would be an easy challenge...his work is wonderful, saves me the effort of scouting out photo reference...Well, NOT! I learned that something happens between the artist and the photo...if taken by the artist, she has a sense of the place...the atmospheric references...the mood... If on the other hand it is someone else's artistic interpretation, it is very hard to do the work justice. So after "finishing" my painting...I thought...I let is sit for a day. When I went up to the studio, I took one look and decided that it was finished, but not in a good way. So out came the painter's knife. While the oil was still relatively wet I scraped off the whole painting and gave it a much needed rest. This morning I went up and in 2-3 hours completed the work, using the scraped out area as a template for the shape, only. At last look, I was satisfied. (Maybe I won't look at it again, until time to frame, and then it will be too late to scrape!)

Whew, these last few paintings...animals, photo assignments for the City Hall project,mountains rendered with a painting brush (and not my own photos/reference sketches) has made me want to "go home." So today I went to a photo reference taken a couple of weeks ago (yep from the car...it is so cold and blowing out here that even the most committed plein air painter would freeze his/her what ever off!)...and painted the high desert again. This work is not finished but already I am feeling more comfortable. It is good to push oneself, and stretch...but it is also good to refine the familiar. I don't think I could spend two lifetimes painting the high desert and ever get bored...or ever get to the point where I didn't have something to learn. Now I need to give that sky some thought...it is not as acid as the photo...but still need to decide gradation or clouds?

I keep working on this mountain...asking myself, "When does work become overworked?" But working with the painting knife is a bit addictive..."just one more stroke," "add a swipe here..." I decided that the blues in the painting as it stood yesterday were to raw; too much chroma, so I reached for the "mud." And then the balance with the shadow side of the mountain was not right....and...and... It no longer resembles Bruce's photo, but then again it is an "interpretation."

After several attempts to capture my view of this mountain, I decided, simplify, simplify...thought he original photo was taken when much of the snow had melted, I preferred a more snowy peak. So with some artist's license I let it snow! Since I was experimenting, I also decided to make this an almost entirely artist knife painting. After working with it a bit...feeling like I was frosting a cake..I got into the moment and had some fun. I am not satisfied with the painting though it is a significant departure from my regular style. It does open some questions for me, however....since I like working with an artist's knife (especially a new small one I purchased)..shall I incorporate more knife work on future paintings?

In a prior blog I mentioned that all of the gallery members were going to take a crack at interpreting, in our own style, one of Bruce Jackson's beautiful photos. Well, this idea (I actually think it was mine) was much more difficult than I thought. Bruce gave us several choices and I chose one of his with a field of flowers and a mountain in alpine glow light in the background, thinking, "I do a lot of landscapes...this should work." NOT! I seem to forget that I don't paint flowers and certainly not fields of flowers...so I limited it to the mountain...and some trees in the foreground... the first attempt left me cold...so I tried to approach it from a different way. i abandoned the brush and used my painting knife. Ah, while this works in some areas, I think I still have a long way to go...and the show hangs in 2 weeks...and the painting knife leaves nice huge layers of paint that may never dry! The learning is that as an artist, I pick my own views...either in the field or from my photo reference...and I understand what I am picking...someone else's vision is different. Well, tomorrow is another day (for this as yet, waaaay unfinished piece).

I have been invited to a small works exhibit (Clearwater Gallery, June, 2011)...as part of the show there is a challenge for artists to paint something "wild." This gallery is in Sisters, Oregon and generally wild does not mean NYC wild, but wild life. So in addition to 4 or 5 new mini paintings (none larger than 8x10) I painted a coyote...a 6x8 coyote. Upon further reading of the instructions for the challenge...after I had painted the coyote...I saw that the painting must not exceed 25 square inches. OOPS! despite using my calculator, pencil and paper, and Excel, I could not get 6x8 to be anything but 48 sq. inches...so off to the easel again (the very small easel)...think this 2.5" x 2.5" ...if my calculator is right...I am within the required size! Actually, it was fun to branch out. I have painted so many ravens and coyotes that I am a bit done with that...on to Hawks! (And back to my real love, landscaps.)