Wollaston Yacht Club Plein Air

The Quincy Art Association organized and hosted this paint out and yours truly was the instructor/demo painter.   We arrived plenty early to get set up and it was a good thing.   We quickly realized (like boaters before a storm) that we needed more ropes (aka bungies).    The wind was gusting to 25-30 mph and it was the first lesson that was discussed regarding successful plein air painting.  The large tent next to me where the painting participants were working actually flipped over.  Equipment must be weighted down to the point were it will not budge!   In every photo, I'm gripping my easel out of habit, even though I was securely tied down.  The bright sun and warm temperatures (low 90s) were also challenging but the participants stuck with it and all came away with a work of art they should be proud of!

This is my painting from the demo, a depiction of the Wollaston Yacht Club and dock with Quincy Bay and some Boston Harbor Islands in the distance. 

Wollaston Yacht Club and Dock

 

 

Traveling With the Brand New Set Up

Six Vieques Paintings

I've already shared my six tropical paintings from Vieques, but I didn't talk about the challenge of painting with a complete change in my usual painting parameters. You'll take one look at the ultra-gorgeous scene I painted that first day and most likely have zero sympathy when I state that it was difficult to get started.  Okay, yes, I'm thinking of that old saying,  "a bad day of fishing beats a great day at the office."

So in the context of being fortunate and grateful to even be on this trip, I'll say that there were challenges. Among them:

• A new lightweight easel (disassembled for flight) 
• A new palette board (no familiar color spots marking my usual placements)
• Unfamiliar hardware used to attach the palette to new easel

  

  Not Exactly Travelling Light

• Stark white, non-toned substrates (usually I use toned surfaces).
• No turpentine (not allowed by security)
• Tropical colors! No recipes on the brain  (especially for that dazzling turquoise ocean)

Yes I suffered through it :)  item by item...

• Once the new easel was put together on Day One, it didn't need to be disassembled again until it was time to fly home.   The assembled easel stowed easily in the back of the rented Jeep for the duration of the trip. 
• The newly cut (and lightweight) 12x16x.25 inch birchwood panel travelled well and though it took some time initially, it felt no different than my heavyweight palette at home once populated with the oil colors.



Modified Aluminum Easel

• The new aluminum easel had "L" brackets attached with couplings that slid up and down on its respective tripod leg.   Three matching drilled holes in the birch palette lined up with three "L's" on easel legs.  See the three red arrows in photo that shows modified easel that allows palette panel to sit in between tripod.
• I typically apply a neutral undertone over the white canvas and let it dry at least overnight.  All the canvases I brought on this trip were stark white and I discovered that because everything here was so brightly lit, the white surface helped me maintain a high, clear color key.
• Oil painting without turpentine was tough.   I wiped my brushes often and used my walnut oil to clean them as well.   This wasn't an acceptable workaround though, and we located the local hardware store where we purchased a small can for $7.
• Color matching was a matter of trial and error.    I had brought the right ingredients (Cerulean blue, pthalo blue, emerald green).  It was a matter of blending these in the right amounts and combinations.    By Day Two - the required rework was reduced somewhat.

So that is the story.  What I didn't cover here about traveling with the oils is the packing and flying, which I'll share in a future post.  If anyone has questions about the customizations to the easel, the palette or color combinations, let me know and I'll be happy to share more.

Local Cranberry Farm

A friend of mine and her husband own a beautiful cranberry farm and she invited me to visit for a paint-out.   She noted that the cranberry harvest was in progress which was music to my ears.   Bogs are harvested one at a time and although I do not profess to know the exact sequence and process, I do know that it is a gorgeous scene once the berries are jarred loose from the plant and float to the top of the flooded bog.

Local Bog - On Site in Progress

Gentle sloping hillsides led to the expansive bogs at the bottom.   Apple trees, cold frames and a rustic fenced vegetable garden dotted the winding country path to the bogs. Some of the massive trees that dotted the property had to be a century or two old.  It was as if I was in a remote rural location instead of a half mile from the busy center of our large town.    

Local Bog

I set up on a slope next to a couple of apple trees to my left, and behind me was the vegetable gardens and domed coldframes which provided a wind block.    From here I had a view of the harvest in progress with two thrasher machines skipping across the watery bog in tandem.     I had hoped for the classic and iconic crimson sea of berries being corralled, but the pre-flood,  maroon bog was stunning as well.  The foliage in the distance and the apple tree next to me provided lots of sunlit color as well.

I was imagining that this 2014 farm scene was probably not much different than it was fifty years ago or more.  It was truly like stepping back in time and a beautiful hidden treasure.

Palette Box

Rectangular Wooden Palette

Palette Box with Foam Core Lid Closed

I use the same rectangular wooden palette for painting both in my studio and outside.    I prefer this arrangement because it eliminates the time and expense of loading and maintaining two palettes.  Since I mostly paint everyday, the fully loaded palette sits on my studio sidetable ready for use.   I don't cover my palette in the studio but I always wipe my mixing area clean at the end of the day.   The piles of paint may develop skins over them, but I simply cut into the pile of paint with my palette knife and draw out what I need from the smooth wet paint underneath.    Every couple of weeks I completely scrape off old paint on the palette and start with fresh new piles. 



For taking the paints outside or into the car, I use a palette box that has been retrofitted with a foam core lid.   The cover is lightweight, opens like a cigar box lid, and is just sturdy enough to protect the palette full of paint inside.





Foam Core Lid Open

Velcro strips that secure palette to palette box

On both the bottom of the palette and the palette box, Velcro strips hold the palette in place within the box.   Even if the box were to tip on its side or even upside down, the palette of paint would stay stuck within the box.


I also have some Velcro strips on the outside of the palette box to secure in on top of my art supply box on wheels if I have to walk a greater distance than usual.

I know there are fancier systems, but this is what I do.





Plymouth Harbor Southern Coastline

 

It was a gorgeous dry day in August.   A waterfront festival was ongoing along Water Street in Plymouth and the street was closed to cars and opened to pedestrians.   As result we couldn't easily gain access to our usual spots.   Instead we traveled a little further south along Route 3A and stopped at a public park on Plymouth Harbor called Stephen's Field.



Windy & Sunny Day Set Up



Plymouth Harbor South Coast in Progress

I have been fine tuning my plein air set up over the past few months.   Today I was able to take advantage of my big umbrella and the back of my vehicle to avoid the wind.   I left the side opening rear door open and placed the umbrella base just below the far left side.   I used a bungy cord to connect the leftmost umbrella spoke (wind facing) to the rear car door.  I wound a long bungy from the top of the umbrella to the base.   This may seem like overkill, but for me, when things are rocking and rolling, I can't concentrate.




Plymouth Harbor South

With the wind issue under control, I rescanned the scene.  It was low tide which revealed some sandbars, salt march grasses and boulders.   As tide was rising, these interesting elements started to be submerged.   I reminded myself that it was important to stay locked into the original composition, because the additional water was not improving it by covering the variety of things that made it attractive at the beginning.

Although it was not a complicated painting, I was happy with the result.   I felt that the sky and water were an exact match to what I saw, even though, per usual, in the in-progress photo they may seem not to match.






Green Backhoe at Duxbury Cranberry Bog

One of my favorite spots for painting is on a stretch of Route 14 in Duxbury, MA at Temple Street next to a small cranberry bog.   This is the same location painted in another one of my paintings, "Pumphouse and Trailer."  A large, aqua backhoe appeared alongside the oxide red shed back in the spring.   I had been thinking that this old relic would make a nice, rustic painting subject.  I'm not sure this piece of equipment has even moved in the past seven months, but perhaps with the impending cranberry harvest, it will see some action.  

Since it is October, the tall summer grasses are leaning over and are bleached out.   In some areas the clover grasses look like they are having a rebirth due to the cool, damp autumn air, the only growth that looks true green.   Even the copse of trees beyond the backhoe and shed have a hint of rusty colored needles as does the ground beneath.   



Rt 14 Duxbury - Bog Backhoe Stage One

My canvas had been the beginnings of a seascape as can be seen in the Stage One Photo.   I blocked in the dark shadows of the distant trees and the backhoe.   Having painted many "red" barns and sheds, I know that they are really never red.   For this shed the sunlit red plane was a warm pink, made from cadmium red, naples yellow and some titanium white.   The shed plane in shadow was a alizarin, cobalt blue shade, with a darker version of that same hue just under the roofline.

Once I sketched in the two main subjects, the shed and the backhoe, I wasn't satisfied that the composition was unified.   I decided to play up the trunks of the trees in the distance between the subjects as a way of connecting them.   I feel like it made it better, but I wonder what an objective observer would think.

The small bog canal enters the scene on the left and winds back around the shed.   It was completely covered with pea green algae, which I didn't like, so I made it blue - initially.   The blue looked wrong and I don't know if it was because I knew it was made up, or if it was the wrong blue, but I decided to mix up some algae green and have it cling to the shorelines.



Bog Backhoe and Shed

The most fun for me as a painter is applying the last small touches on a painting.   For this painting, there were about four things I did at the end on the dry painting.  It amounts to punching up (down?) the darkest and lightest spots.   In applying these finishing touches, I try to do it in one stroke to give it a loose look

1) Retouched the darkest darks under the shed and backhoe.
2) Used my "sideways" bristle brush dipped in some naples yellow (and in some places cad red) to touch on the random dried out grasses. This softens the mid-distance greens too.
3) Mixed a cool white with just a tinge of cobalt to brighten the shed trim that was sunlit
4) Used a lemony (cool) yellow to lighten the sunlit side of the backhoe.