Happy Thanksgiving

I had fun growing these pumpkins. While the rest of the garden respected their boundaries, these guys were a menace to the neighborhood. I had to go out and hack the vine out of the lilac bushes and off of the garden fence. I gloried in the new orange blossoms everyday. And now, instead of being pumpkin pie, they will continue to entertain me all winter with a layer of ice and a topping of snow.

The darkness of night adds a unity to a painting...and a new degree of difficulty. Is the cast light the correct value? I can't see any orange, but will they "read" as pumpkins without it? What color of light am I casting from the headlamp over my hat?

I completed this painting about 11PM and turned to see my next door neighbor drinking wine and watching this unusual outdoor sport from the warmth of her kitchen window. I was under an umbrella pitched at an angle in the snow while sleet was watering my driveway. She is used to these observations.

Three Moods of Lake Pepin

I felt good about the fact that I balanced kayaking and painting. Here are the three paintings that I completed during a beautiful fall weekend in October with Inland Sea Kayakers at Hok-Se-La campground in Red Wing.

The one on the top is early morning. The above was done in 20 minutes after dinner in rapidly fading light. I like the raw authenticity of it. Plan to do some winter night scenes with this method.

The one above was more successful before I took it home and decided to push the color. I find that my best sketches are on location without "studio work." Who needs a studio when you have the whole outdoors to play in!

Autumn

Autumn is blasting in with fabulous weather and color. Here is a scene from Fort Snelling Golf Course. There was a bit of adventure with this painting that included a historic building, seeking some outdoor privacy and a police car. Yikes!

Green to Go

Green is quickly being replaced by the lovely colors of Fall (I know it is out of style to Capitalize, but I think seasons warrant Capitalization), so thought it was time to post a couple of August paintings before they were totally irrelevant. This painting is special to me. It has the hand of Joe Paquet on it. View his website to see what plein aire paintings with correct values and character of line look like.

STOP

I am seeing a lot to paint in my neighborhood--all the undiscovered relationships between trees, houses, and sidewalks, and even trees with stop signs. It occurred to me that the tree was not complete without its connection to the stop sign. The angle doesn't matter, these two elements are connected.

The only reason that this is important is that a couple of years ago I painted several Home Portraits and was asked to remove the big tree in the painting so the front of the house could be viewed with the glory of the front garden displayed. No one had ever witnessed this perspective of the particular house, so the painting looked wrong, despite winter reference photos and cast shadows from the aborted tree. So I guess relationship matters even to stop signs and their tree buddies. I confess that I tried to leave the stop sign out, but, well, something stopped me.

The Lightness of Being 1

Oblivious

How easily
We divide and conquer the hours,
Relegating and naming them:
This, as important...that, as unimportant,
This, for the body...that, for the soul,
Believing
We have somehow become
Wise,
Self-disciplined,
Masters of our lives.

But surprisingly, at the far end
Of a long life's march,
We begin to long once more
For the days when
Time was a river, and we
But a small and insignificant leaf
Afloat on its surface,
Oblivious to all
But the flow and touch
Of the water.

Copyright  Sharon K Sheppard

I thought Sharon's poem and my painting would make a good pairing. Relax, let your head roll back, close your eyes and think of floating on water....(not of multi-tasking)....Um-m-m-m-m...

Freedom

I have the freedom to paint anything I want. I am not restricted by the government to certain subjects, however, I wouldn't mind if the Republic paid me to paint my comrades according to the fabulous documentation that was produced by Russian artists of the working class in the 19th and early 20th centuries. I admire their work greatly.

OK, let's say I get a letter tomorrow and I am assigned to the service sector for documenting and exalting their fine work. The paintings would be pale interiors with fluorescent lighting, my comrades would all be wearing dockers or crop pants. No lovely headscarves. No students studying by candle light. No beautiful working hands and muscular arms to show in paint. Even if I got the logging assignment in the NW, the work would largely be done by a roaring tractor with a giant claw. We have computers, and conveniences, and really nice stuff, but somewhere along the way we lost our connections (and I am not referring to social networking). My paintings of the service sector wouldn't have the same joy or passion that I see in the old Russian paintings. So now you think I am going to write a suggestion or give advice for improving sociey? I guess it's a personal choice. Spend more time in nature, find your own joy and wear a head scarf just to try it out. And paint more...