More Winter on the California Coast

"Misty Christmas on the California Coast"
Andrew Molera State Park
15" x 18"

Continuing the theme of winter, here is another painting inspired by Christmases spent in the Big Sur area 0n the California Coast. That year we hiked in Andrew Molera State Park to the sea along Big Sur River. I loved this simple scene of evergreens backing dried grasses along the trail. You can see another view of the park that includes the river in an earlier post.

I started and completed this painting during my Thursday night art group. Our numbers were decimated by winter colds, so three of us joined together for a lovely evening of painting. I was hosting and searching at the last minute for art supplies and a subject. I grabbed a 300 pound Arches cold press paper, not my usual 140 pound paper, and a folder of photos of subject matter that emotionally connects with me. Thinking winter, I settled on this scene. I wet the entire sheet, did not sketch out the scene, and used a limited Stephen Quiller pallette, ala Tom Fong's Fast and Loose approach. For the trees, I used Ultramarine Blue, Permanent Orange, and Burnt Sienna. Latter I went back in and introduced a bit of green mixed from Thalo Blue and Cad Yellow Deep. I worked at adding variety in the values. The grasses are Permanent Orange, Cad Yellow Deep, Thalo Green, and Magenta. I scratched in some weeds and added Permanent Orange to some. I had fun doing some positive and negative painting. This morning at critique group, I got a thumbs up on this one without any suggestions for changes.

These California winter scenes are a marked contrast to ones I have painted of winters in North Danville, VT, where son Jeff's family has a small farm with horses. Recently I painted "Winter in the Garden" from a photo Jeff took a couple weeks ago. Having grown up in Vermont, I could feel the cold, crisp air and the bright sunshine in late afternoon. To give you another view of that garden, here is a photo Jeff sent a couple days ago of two of the three horses in the great snowstorm that covered a third of our nation.

"Photo by Jeff Paquet"

The horses' blankets are covered with the snow falling and the hillside behind the trees and garden is completely obscured. The water tub for the horses has a heater to keep it from freezing in Vermont's Northeast Kingdom where I have experienced -42 degrees.

Another Vermont Painting

"Vermont Mud Season"
Watercolor
14" X 18"

In my home state of Vermont, a couple weeks in the spring are known as "mud season." The snow is dirty and beginning to melt. The hundreds of miles of dirt roads, the unpaved driveways, the farm roads, and anyplace lacking asphalt turns into a soupy mess. The neat thing about mud season is it signals that the long snowy winter is almost over. You can check out Vermont Mud Season on Google and find many stories and pictures. Here is a link to a fun picture and story that will give you a feel for what I painted.

My painting is an imaginary scene, from my recollections of mud seasons past, started as my very first painting in Tom Fong's class. Without drawing any lines on totally wet paper, he showed us how he created a simple piece with a tree, some mountains and a house. We were instructed to do something similar. So I conjured up mud season. The class was fast-moving and I was busy being assistant coordinator, so I didn't get to finish the painting in class. Last night our Thursday night South Side Art Club met at Penny's house and I put the finishing touches, to bring order from chaos, as Tom describes his preferred process.

To create his tree and house, Tom used a single-edge razor to squeegee the paint from the paper for the trunk and the buildings from the wet paper. That is why you see some green in the roofs of my buildings because I was totally inexperienced at this process. When the paper dried enough, I added color to the buildings. I had added some color to the trunk and painted in some of the branches. I had left some open edges, thinking about adding light to the tree. Last night I created more branches and used orange to suggest light on the tree. I added a dark treeline where the mountain meets the flatter land. Next I painted a few more strokes of color to create the muddy snow.

Tom Fong-Inspired Fall Scene

"September Morning, Vermont"
21" x 15"

September mornings in Vermont vary between clear sun and crisp air with frost on the ground, and cool mist that softens the landscape. On this misty morn, color tinges the foliage, a few bright red leaves adorn trees, rust and gold emerge on the lush late summer foliage. Shapes are muted and the edges of the path softly blend with the meadow grasses. Soon the fall leaves will bring fiery beauty to the mountains, but this September morning dampens the skin and quietly surrounds on a morning walk.

This piece had it's start in Tom Fong's class. He encouraged us to paint as many pieces as we could between demos. I finished the work at my Thursday evening South Side Art Club and added a few finishing touches early this morning to bring order to chaos, as Tom describes the process. I lifted out a few lights and added a few splatters to the red leaves. I painted wet-into-wet for all but a few of the grasses and branches.

The nice thing about Tom's method is you can look at reference materials, pick some shapes, and then tap into your memories. Jeanne Rousseau handed me a photo, perhaps from Oregon? I turned a stream into a path (a suggestion from Don and Alison, some of my Thursday artists, as I neared completion), used a couple trees and my personal color scheme to represent Vermont, where I grew up and visit often. I always take a long walk about 6 a.m.

I am synthesizing what I have learned over the years and in recent workshops. Some of my shape-making, boldness, and color choices were honed in the Stephen Quiller workshop in April. You can reference the description of that workshop here. Gerald Brommer's workshop on collage emerges in abstract shapes and the play of varying textures. (Myrna Wacknov recently featured Brommer's Santa Cruz workshop on her blog - awesome.) Willingness to experiment and be bold was influenced by Betsy Dillard Stroud's workshop. My work continues to evolve.

Tom Fong Workshop: Day 3 of "Watercolor Bold and Spontaneous"

"High on a Hill ... in San Francisco"
15" x 20 "
Watercolor

Instructor Tom Fong's Partially Complete Demo
Coit Tower, San Francisco
Watercolor

First, apologies for somewhat crooked photos of the paintings -- best can do with my primative process. My piece is also missing about an inch on the right side. I failed to get a photo of Tom's finished cityscape.

On the final day of Tom's workshop, I was especially busy and we finished early so our wonderful volunteer setup and takedown crew can do their job at the Historic Hoover Theater where we rent space. I was busy with the assistant coordinator duties, which include ordering and fetching lunch for the instructor and some attendees, setting out the hospitality table items for morning and afternoon, cleanup, and fulfilling Tom's request to set up a raffle for end of day. I got to mostly complete one painting. Most folks did two.

Tom is very good about asking for feedback each day and inviting requests. Some of his work is city scenes, so we asked him to do one. They are more time consuming, because they require some drawing. Tom used a light grey paint to draw the Coit tower scene with his No. 8 round brush on dry paper. Using a stock photo, he created his own impression of the city. The buildings are neither duplicates nor as dense as in the photo. They are representative of the block shapes so common in San Francisco. Even Coit Tower was modeled mostly from memory. He began applying paint, starting with yellow, to selected buildings. He wet the paper as needed. Notice how Tom lets the paint flow across lines and below buildings. He then came in with darks, creating the Cypress trees around the tower and interspersing darks with lights. Some of the landscape is suggested with bold brush strokes of color that he repeatedly modifies. The finished piece included shadows on the buildings, and paint on the Bay and in the sky area. Tom left some white in both. Tom's work shows the influence of his friend, Henry Fukuhara, a wonderful artist who died this year at 96 , painting to the end in spite of losing his sight. Use Google to check out images of Henry's work.

We were in San Francisco on Wednesday with my son's family, showing my teenage granddaughters this lovely city, so the sights, shapes, and colors of the city were fresh in my mind. I selected a photo of the skyline that includes the Transamerica Building (the pyramid shape). I made up the curvy downhill street and following Tom's example, created shapes in the foreground. You can see my grey drawing lines. The piece was sopping wet and incomplete at critique time. Tom said the painting is successful. His suggestions included adding shadows and not to represent every window on the buildings, which I very well know and forget when I get caught up in the process. This morning, I put in the shadows and softened some edges, and some windows. This is a very fun way to do city scenes and I will do more.

On the first day Tom also demoed doing florals in his loose and wet approach, which I didn't get time to tackle. That will be next, and then I will show you his demo and my results. I want to make some of my knowledge more intuitive (I believe intuition has a lot of learning and experience behind it). While painting I must remember to keep some white passages if I deem them appropriate, to lead the eye through the painting, and alternate lights and darks. Of course, the darks make parts of the painting really pop, so I can't be timid.

Tom is very generous and stated that he's been fortunate and does not worry about making a living from his art. He raffled off two nice brushes, three sets of paint, and his first demo painting, a real treasure for the winner.