Texas Hill Country

After months of letting this blog sit quietly waiting for a new post... here I am. I would like to apologize for the fact that I have not been more diligent in my posting! Here's to the future... it's the first day of the rest of my blog posting life.

So we are in Texas, in hill country for a few months. This is our first time here and let me tell you if you have not spent any time in Texas it really is big. Bigger even than you may think it is. We are continually wowed by just how vast it is. We arrived in state a little over a month ago and have seen the Dallas/Fort Worth area, Austin and San Antonio as well as many of the small ranch towns that dot hill country. Currently we are outside of Kerrville near Fredericksburg. I have been painting the Texas landscape for a month now and have found a few challenges here.

The first being the harsh sunlight. The second being the density of the foliage (I am always searching for that one singled out interesting tree with a great unobstructed view of a hilly background) and the third being the barbed wire fences which deny my access to many a perfect view for a painting! Each locale we have traveled through has presented it's challenges whether it was clouds of biting insects, lurking alligators or here, the worry of being nailed by a deer hunter in white tail season while scouting for a scene to paint. But you learn to work around them all eventually!

My latest piece I have completed here is a view of the Guadalupe River which flows just out back of where we are camping. It's late morning light on a relatively clear day. I strove to capture the rich hues of the foliage and the distinct blues and reflective qualities of the river itself.



I was thinking of George Inness while working through this piece... Fall colors, contrasting orange hues with the blues. I simplified the hills in the distance in order to bring the eye to the trees as a focal point. This river is lined with really great trees. Some of them are a real challenge to capture because of their enormity.

I hope to travel down to Bandera over the next week or so to work and also to complete another piece or two from the river banks where we are here. I will also be visiting the museum for The Cowboy Artists of America. There are several artists I am interested in which are members of this group. If anyone reading has any recommendations for this area fire away!