$195 unframed

11×14 oil on canvas panel This one was done from an on location value sketch, written notes and several reference photos. I won’t be putting this one on eBay, but I will leave it here with the price shown for anyone interested.

Recently, Brendy Vaughn (a wonderfully colorful painter) commented on one of my landscapes (Early Fall) and mentioned, “I so want to be able to do landscapes but just haven’t been able to get them to look the way I want. Practice, practice, practice I guess.” She’s right, of course, about the practice part, and going outside to do it is the best way I know of. In my answer to her comment I wrote about one approach I enjoy,

“You might try out quick value sketches of a scene that catches your attention. Then, write notes on your sketch describing color, light/shade, or whatever seems to be important to you. Shoot some photos both near and far to remind you of details you want to include. Then, back in your studio, build the painting from that experience and give it your own special emphasis. The memory and imagination work together to provide the simplification of what often overwhelms us when we’re on the site.”

Painting on location is great fun and extremely challenging. With practice we can learn to come home with rather nice, fresh and complete painting statements. But this approach helps to develop the observation skills and editing that needs to take place in order to escape the frustration of being overwhelmed with what’s before us. Try it sometime. You may be very pleasantly surprised.

If you work from memory, you are most likely to put in your real feeling. (Robert Henri)

Imaginations blossom amidst memories. One judiciously separates them – but is there really any point in that? Doesn’t truth suffer when one amputates it from its context of dreams? (Jean Helion)