I'm Back!

Wow...sorry for the looong lag in posts there. Things have been crazy for the past few weeks. We brought home a new puppy and a few days later left to go out to Martha's Vineyard for a week. We have since returned and are now settled in to a new campsite up in Southern Maine. I have not been painting as much for the past few weeks due to all the activity and moving around...and Rudy (the puppy) has demanded a ton of attention as well.

I did get tons of great photographs during our stay on the island and while I prefer to paint from life I will use the pics over the next few months to do a few works from the Vineyard. I did paint out with my Father and his best friend Allen Whiting a few times. Allen has a sheep farm in West Tisbury which has been in his family for several generations. It is a wonderful place to paint with old barns, pastures, woods and of course...sheep. Allen is also a painter and it is always a pleasure to hang out with he and my Dad and put paint to canvas.




The above shot is an old truck overgrown with foliage and over taken by rust out back on the farm. My Father has painted it a few times... it's a great nostalgic and sentimental image for me. You can click on the photo to see a larger version of it. I do have a Whiting farm scene on eBay right now which can be seen by clicking HERE.

I'll post my new work from Maine over the next week or so. We spent the day yesterday out on Cape Elizabeth and I am finishing up a coastal piece. Maine is one of my favorite places to paint so this Summer should bring some great paintings.

RISD Museum and Second Dam Pond

This newest work is of an area where we used to hang out when I was kid much the same as the last piece. This is a fresh water pond in the woods of Swansea near the old historic town center and Abrahms Rock. We used to fish, swim and canoe the waters here. Bethany and I hiked back the other day to check out the old dam and see what the area looks like after all these years. I was surprised to see a few houses on the other side of the creek but otherwise it's all pretty much as I remember. I like the results I achieved in this piece. I tried to capture the true light and atmosphere in mid afternoon on a sunny, humid day.

Today we drove into Providence to visit the RISD Museum of Fine Art. They have a surprisingly nice collection there. The museum houses several pieces from Sargeant, Monet, Renoir and an impressive array of other American and French Impressionists. The main hall of the gallery is hung in the traditional salon style from the late 19th century. It's brilliant to view upon entering the room but does make study of each individual work impossible which is a little disappointing!







I did photograph one piece which really accurately represents the technique of peinture claire I was discussing in my last post. The work is by Theodore Robinson and has that luminous quality I have been interested in. Even the shadows are infused with light in this landscape which brings the whole tonal quality up and creates an entirely different atmosphere.