Christmas Still Life

2012 Christmas Still Life Set Up

 The Christmas decorations are up and everything is sparkling.   For this year's Christmas still life painting, I chose a few festive objects, a Santa Claus statue, some holly, a roll of curling ribbon and a wine bottle gift tube.    I covered my still life shelf with gold satin fabric. The wine bottle tube had some height to it so I elected to turn the canvas portrait style.    The Santa was in the middle with holly and berries at his feet.

The first photo shows the set up and an early version of the painting. I made the mistake of using some Ivory Black of a cheap brand to fill in the background. It was like trying to spread black lard across the surface. I ended up wiping it off canvas, scraping it off my palette and throwing the tube away. I dug out my Gamblin Ivory Black and used that mixed with some Prussian Blue for the background.    I vow to not use that cheap paint again.

Christmas Still Life before Ribbon

I liked the wine tube because the top had a mottled gold pattern that I painted by layering with my palette knife.  I took some liberties with the color and pumped it up in a few places.   Here was the painting after completing the objects, but prior to adding the shiny red ribbon.   At this point I was thinking that this painting was fun and relaxing after several plein air, and live model paintings in a row. It's not that those aren't fun too; it's just that they are much more demanding mentally and physically.

Then easy fun became challenging fun.  The painting was fairly dry and ready for adding the ribbon.
This is a photo of the painting prior to taking the last bold step which was to paint a long twisting strand of red curling ribbon coming off the roll and winding all around the painting.

Christmas Still Life w Curling Ribbon

I unfurled several feet of it and wove the curls in and out of the objects on the shelf so that it travelled all over.    (I did something similar on another painting "Gotta Get Gardening," in which I used gardening jute the same way).   What I wanted the ribbon to do was unify the objects by connecting them and potentially supplying an overt guide to the viewer when scanning the painting. 

For the record, the jute was much easier since it had a uniform thickness and no shine.   The ribbon had the complexity of a shiny side and opaque side as well as the changes in the ribbon from visible to invisible, varying widths and twirls.

Here is the painting with the ribbon and its shadows.   The question is, should I have left the ribbon off?   Maybe.   Well too late now.

Merry Christmas!

Green Harbor Jetty

Green Harbor in December

Even though it is December, temperatures the day of this painting were in the high fifties.   With full sun and added warmth from the water's reflection, it was comfortable for painting plein air.   I have been wanting to do a beach painting to record the low angle of the winter sun.   The long, low sunrays give the water, sand and sky a cool northern look that I wanted to capture.

I set up at the base of the concrete public beach steps facing northeast.   The sun was shining directly on my canvas, my palette and my back.   The tide was coming up so I estimated that I only had about an hour.  

Green Harbor Jetty

Matching the color of the water was not hard because I could mix my color, hold it up in the bright sun and check the match against the horizon.   I measured up from the bottom of the panel to make sure the horizon line was level.   I then applied that dark mixture (ultramarine, transparent oxide brown and a little white) to draw in the horizon.  The mid-distance water was lighter (more sky influence) and I made that from cobalt, ultramarine and white.   The closest breaking water had more green in it (because of the churned up sand and shallow depth.)   I made that with some viridian, sap green and my mid distance blue.    For the long uniform waves, I first painted a dark skinny wedge that receded to the left.   I then painted dark brushstrokes of ultramarine, viridian, sap green started at the bottom of the wave's underside and curved up at a about a thirty degree angle to where the wave's break would be.  After I got all the dark strokes in, I used my palette knife to smear the darks against each other, not to blend, but to have them sit beside each other smoothly, like is common in these kind of waves.

Plucky Cranberry Bog

Plucky Bog Set Up

There are dozens of cranberry bogs in the Marshfield and Duxbury area.  I try to be vigilant in watching for flooded bogs because I know that immediately following the flood, the cranberry thrashing and crimson harvest will occur.   I wish I knew the local bog harvest schedule because these bogs are tucked into various backroads that aren't visible from my regular routes.  



Plucky Bog First Painting Stage One

When I haven't been able to find a flooded bog, there are always the non-flooded bogs - the scene chosen on this day.


Plucky Bog First Painting Stage Two

The "Plucky" cranberry bog is located on East Street in Duxbury and it runs alongside Route 3.   Aside from the constant whiz of highway traffic, the spot was perfect for painting a typical Southeastern New England cranberry bog scene.     It was not flooded, but rather it was moist, peat-rich, and dark magenta color. 

The color shown in the Stage One painting depicts a magenta shade that was too light and too intensely purple.  The morning sun was to the east and it was casting light on the far grassy bank.   There was a pumphouse on the other end used for feeding the water channels that surrounded and cut through the bogs.


I started a second round of changes lightening the sky and adding the jet contrails.  I also changed the color of the bog, making it much redder.   It was still not right. Although colorful, I though it was too red, so I put it aside.  I need to come back to this one.




Plucky Bog Second Painting Stage One

I grabbed another canvas and turned toward the south.  

Really accomplished artists would never begin another painting for the reason I did at this point.  The reason was that I had a lot of paint on my palette and I didn't want to waste it!   


Plucky Bog Second Painting Stage Two

Quick studies with leftover paint mixtures can be pleasant surprises and this was one good result I think.  



The painting that got the least amount of time turned out the best.   I think it is true that warming up can be a valid exercise for painting as it is for anything else.  It can help a painter get into a groove, work out some flaws and can result in a fresher more spontaneous result.   






Built in 1923 - Study

It was a perfect fall plein air day in Marshfield.  We set up at a sunny local spot at the bottom of a grassy hill adjacent to the Furnace Brook in Marshfield, MA.    An abandoned building sat atop the hill with the words "Built in 1923" engraved in mortar over the front door's roof peak.   What was this building anyway?   Back at the computer later that day, and despite searching the online land records and town municipal building information, I was not able to determine what the original use was for this old building on Hatch Street.  My guess was that it had been a school or municipal building.  It is now located right next to a new modern school.  

Hatch St Building Built in 1923

What attracted me was the building's architecture.   It had red brick facade and large arched windows, but a closer look revealed that the building was boarded up with plywood on some of the broken windows. From the bottom of the hill looking up through the autumn color though, the gracefully arched windows and roof line looked almost regal.  Once something becomes the center of interest of a painting, its status is instantly elevated, no matter what it really looks like.

This is just a quick study, but I am considering doing a larger studio painting using this and my photos for reference