SATURDAY PAINT-OUT

After much morning drama, which included me loosing my wallet for 2 hours (in my house no less) causing us to miss Traci and Rich's baby shower,and then getting stuck in horrble traffic, meaning a super-late start, Echo and I finally made it down to Brandywine Park in Wilmington to paint. We drove sepreately as she has to work Sunday and got seperated on the drive down, so by the time I made it to the park she and Thomas we waiting. It was aslo 95 degrees and a bit muggy, the flies were biting my legs within 15 minutes..@#%&*! next time long pants. We all too advantage of the shade under the big overpass, but still it was one hot momma, luckily I packed our cooler with water and ice drinks.


We missed our painting buddies Pahl and Catherine who went on ahead of us, so by the time we found the spot and set up it was probably 430. So despite our intention to get set up early and paint, we ended up having to chase the sun as we painted. I had primed a few canvases this morning with acrylic, setting them in the sun to dry, and Echo and I each picked a 12 x 9 to do, not too big as we wouldn't have time to do a larger paintings with the time clicking away.

Thomas lays in his charcooal sketch.


I went to work fast massing in the shapes and trying to get the major valuse down and related to each other, wanting to keep the foreground and background clear.

here is the painting where I stopped it, there was still a lot more to do, but time , or the sun ran out.
See a larger pic HERE.

I was particularly excited to paint today because last week we wanted to go and were rained out and Echo had never tried painting in oils before. It has been a year exactly almost to the date since I last painted anything, and that was the stil life I did when staying with Bret in Prescott AZ last summer after San Diego con.
So each picked our view and I made up both palettes, I put freezer paper over the tops and uses clips to hold it down, this saved the muss and fuss at the end as we could just toss it away or fold it up andscrape any extra good paint off at home. two empty FEDEX boxes would hold the pallettes for the trip home.
s quick.

I started in right away and tried to block in the big masses and values fast as I could see the shadows were now going to start marching fast and 30 minutes would result in a big change in the values of the foreground and background. I keep an eye on Echo and Thomas, going over and giving Thomas some pointers on his charcoal drawing he had underway. Echo seemed to take to this whole thing like a duck to water, she made fast progress with here block-in.

As we painted away many people who were enjoying the day outside would stop and comment, one little kid really wanted to come close and his mom asked it it was ok.
A friendly park ranger stopped to chat and tell us of other cool places to paint further down into the park, so we may try that next time.

I have to say it was exilerating, totally absorbing and frustrating at the same time. You realize that once you are outside nature has the upper hand and you have to keep moving fast, and fight the urge to add details too early. I also realize how much I have to go as a painter, painting one painting a year isn't gonna get me anywhere! So Echo and I have vowed to try and do it once a week along with the figure drawing..so this will be a big commitment.

Anyway, we had about 2-2 1/2 hours to accomplish what we could today, we wrapped up a liitle before 8, by that time the sun had dropped below the treeline and the values were all changed too much to continue. Echo finished first while I tried to dash in a few little extra bits, so the painting was stopped but the painting really isn't finished. I aslo need to buy some better brushes, the ones I have are ok.

Looking forward to next week already.