It has been a while since I shared the insight of what I am thinking as I make a painting. It isn’t magical, but it is, instead, a personal walk through the creative process. Thanks for asking that I do this again.

Using a coupon for a substantial discount from a local art store, I took a financial leap of faith and bought a 24″ x 48″ high grade canvas and prepaid for a custom frame of stacked linen with red oak to frame it.  I am free now to go back, when I’m done with the painting, to have the framing completed at any time in the future.

Beginning the painting. It will be a cumulative view from many images in my mind; favorite feelings, images that I have enjoyed, and places I have walked. I may  or may not reference some photos. My hope it’s that it can be that visual touchstone of daily calm, and will no doubt be my biggest challenge yet.

Since this is a bit larger than my usual canvas it won’t fit on my easel well so I rigged up a clamp and board setup on my drafting board. The angle is a little different but I will adjust. I needed to pull lights for each side so I can see since the overhead is now behind me and casts too many shadows to be effective. I discovered that a board can sit across the two C-clamps holding the canvas ridge and give me a place to put brushes and the like.

From here on I will take pictures of the process periodically but will not stop and post at those moments. The mental switch from images to words would make that workflow far too disruptive. Rest assured, however, I already began painting yesterday and will post another “catching up” post later this morning.

I spent part of my time this weekend at the easel and it felt good. It’s that time of the year when I come back inside from a long summer outdoors traveling, camping and painting and I have to re-establish my discipline of sitting down  in front of a canvas and painting from some of the photos I’ve taken.

It’s kind of funny, I can get rusty in pretty short order if I don’t paint regularly. This painting is another relatively small canvas but the image appealed to me because the water was reflecting the landscape.
I had the opportunity to be on Madeline Island in July, and took a walk one evening with friends. There was a park with some nice walking paths along the southern edge of Lake Superior on the island’s shore. The sun was setting quietly and the water on the inlet was so still. I hope you enjoy the look of it as much as I did.

Even though the season for traveling and taking pictures is not completely done yet, I find myself already anxious to get started on some of the pictures I’ve taken. This first piece is painted from a shot that I took one evening when we were out for a drive in the country. 

I started this painting on Sunday afternoon and this first photo on the left is how far I got that evening. I don’t have too many process pictures for this painting because it fell together pretty rapidly but I thought it might be fun for you to see my priorities.

The second shot on the above right is what happened on Monday night. In this phase of the painting I blocked in where and how I wanted the tree to grow and concentrated on the water’s surface and the grasses. 

The last evening I completed the painting by adding the greenery on the tree and enhancing some of the details that still needed to be finished. It’s fun now that I’ve learned how to pick up speed.

This is a remarkably simple subject – just calm water in late afternoon or early evening sun. I love the quiet light that early evening offers, right before dark. Last light touches the water’s surface and the edges of grasses and makes the color slightly heightened.

I hope you can hear the crickets?

I haven’t been free to work in my studio very often these last couple of weeks. Life balance is always a challenge for an artist – to find the time to spend at their craft and still work at a full-time job and have social activities. As with anything, when there is an ebb and flow in one part of our life we shift and allocate time to another important part. Yesterday I was able to sit down and finish this painting. 

This is the third painting that I started at the Kalamazoo Trade Show. It is a playful little illustration of the vendor display across the isle from me in my room in trader’s hall. The young man who was helping this vendor was delightful and made me think of all of the apprentices who learned at the shoulders of mentoring tradesmen in the 18th and 19th century. Best wishes to Delbert, my fine model and period apprentice.