October 2013 – Page 2 – paintandsimple

Posted on October 9, 2013 by paintandsimple · 2 Comments

Painting While Waiting

I remember a few years ago my husband made a comment that changed my life. He observed that everyone wanted more time, but not the time they had. I asked him to clarify. He said “everyone wants more time right?” I was with him so far…then he added “but people are constantly given little pieces of time that they don’t want.” That seemed crazy to me. He clarified…” For example people are irritated if they have to wait on an elevator, or in traffic.”

He told me that he had started to recognize these little gifts of time in his own life. It is great to have such a wise husband.

Many days I do my painting while I am waiting…at ballet class, or voice lessons, or guitar lessons, or cross country practice, or at the finish line of an ultra marathon race. I keep a small bag packed, with little pieces of paper, reference photos, and a small box of pastels…and 20 minutes of waiting becomes a delightful little gift.

Here I am, painting while waiting for my husband and sons to finish a race, fortunately for me, they prefer to run trails, and it is often somewhere lovely to do a plein air study.

Posted on October 3, 2013October 3, 2013 by paintandsimple · 3 Comments

Norbuck – late afternoon

Perfect place to spend an afternoon. Who is up for a short trail run?

Posted on October 1, 2013October 1, 2013 by paintandsimple · 4 Comments

The Swing

HOW do you like to go up in a swing,
Up in the air so blue?
Oh, I do think it the pleasantest thing
Ever a child can do!

Up in the air and over the wall,
Till I can see so wide,
Rivers and trees and cattle and all
Over the countryside—

Till I look down on the garden green,
Down on the roof so brown—
Up in the air I go flying again,
Up in the air and down!

Stevenson, Robert Louis (1850–1894). A Child’s Garden of Verses and Underwoods. 1913.

In case you are curious, here is how I started this painting. First I identified why I wanted to paint the painting: I loved the movement of the swing and dappled light of the trees in the background. Then I planned my approach: I started on sanded Wallis paper that I under painted with pink and red pastel, and then washed with denatured alcohol. I chose those colors because red is the compliment of green, and this panting is mostly green. Then I drew a skeleton of lines in light blue so I wouldn’t get lost, next I put in my darkest darks in a dark blue green (it looks almost black in the photo, like a true impressionist, I never use black). I unified shadows and darks and added and deleted until I had roughly an S shaped composition of darks. I liked the tension of the tire swing being cropped out. After I had the groundwork established, the rest was just play! What I am most pleased with in the finished painting: her feet.