Cranberry Bog in January

Stage One

The deep freeze that had had a grip on us last week eased up and today was a paint out day.  It's mid-January but it was a whopping fifty degrees which felt like sixty-five to me.   I noticed that although most of the snow pack in the area had melted, the cranberry bogs were still covered with a white frozen layer.

I have painted at this cranberry bog along Route 139 and Temple Street in Duxbury many times, but never when it was frozen.   Usually the allure of the bright red cranberry harvest gets me to come here, but this winter scene was pretty in a different way.  I did the first painting facing southwest and the shadows were coming toward me.

Stage Two

There were tall, dark pines bordering the marsh on the far side, and another lower but more distant treeline beyond that spanned the whole background.   I liked the variety of tree heights against the skyline.  I wanted to keep the center of interest to be the tall pines and after I painted the foreground, I thought that those foreground grasses were competing.  I used a large flat brush to softly blur the foreground grasses and snow.

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Tall Dark Pines at Winter Bog

Temple St Bog Cedar - Stage One

The second painting was looking north and the sun was on my back (and the canvas).   From this angle, the frozen marsh was on the left, Temple Street was entering on the right and they converged at a big old cedar.   Not fussing with detail really makes the result better - I think.   I did pump up the color of the warm, gold grasses, for the sake of a prettier painting.    I really like the cedar's long blue shadow across the road.

Big Old Cedar at Winter Bog

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