Day 4 - 2009 Pacific Northwest :: Plein Air Painting Competition

Off on my own in the morning along with my support crew. We stopped at my favorite Aspen grove and spent most of the morning starting two paintings. Then we drove over to todays paint out location at Hollenbeck Park for my third start of the day. I think these three paintings have potential, but will not be in the show as today is the deadline for submitting work. This has been my plan. I have six paintings to submit and these three from yesterday will serve to give me material for the future.

I love Hollenbeck Park. Some people came around and brought the artists iced tea and cookies. I spent a fair amount of time visiting and meeting people. It was a spectacular day!

Sold - Day 3 - 2009 Pacific Northwest :: Plein Air Painting Competition

I know, I know…..I skipped yesterday, and went from day 1 to day 3. I ended up unhappy with my painting so went out early this morning to this spot. We had a big fire West of us and the residual smoke is still hanging around. Happily it makes for great aerial perspective and a wonderful pink glow to the light. When we first arrived everything was bathed in a pink light and this influenced the color choices I made for the painting. Later the sun was behind some clouds so rather than chase the light; I stuck to the original idea. This is NOT what I did yesterday. I spent the morning chasing light and shadow with less than satisfactory results.

Sold - Nearing Harvest

Day 1 - 2009 Pacific Northwest :: Plein Air Painting Competition

Water Music - 12" x 16" Studio

Sold - Water Music on the Little Klickitat

This is the final result of this mornings plein air efforts. See the post below for another view of me painting and Buckley waiting.

I was standing in the middle of the river on some rocks and it seemed to work very nicely. Then my shoes got a little wet and then the rocks became wet and very slippery. As the rocks became more slippery my shoes became more wet and so on and so forth until I gave up. I am very happy with the results so maybe that works for me.

Today's Paintout with Buckley

Standing in the middle of the Little Klickitat. The results of this outing will be posted later........

The Little White Salmon

After driving around all morning and having great difficulty getting to this river, suddenly we came to a bridge and I managed to scramble down to the water. I took photo's and decided to setup my easel. This painting is a studio painting but retains much of the excitment and feel of what it was to be along the river.

I was excited and happy to be here and I hope it shows in the painting. To be so completely happy is the only way to describe what it is like to paint plein air.

The Salmon Run and The "Little" White Salmon River

Today we went on a little outing to the Little White Salmon River. A new place. Getting to these rivers is a challenge and we were happy to find a place where the road crosses the river and stopped. I painted under the bridge. This place had everything. Moss covered rocks, Queen Ann's Lace, water, salmon, and sounds. The winter months are not going to be long enough for all the new ideas that I have going.....

Clouds over Adams

The White Salmon River

The White Salmon River is a wonderful river with various falls, and runs cold from melting snow on Mt Adams. The water is like ice. Buckley did get a few cold drinks as I painted here.

1st Place and being an American

This painting received 1st place at The Dalles Art Center. The show is called "Gorge Artists Create" and the show will run the month of August.

Grab some kleenex and then click on this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9306gUTzUOc

Sometimes the news and the all of the yammering that goes on creates the illusion that the people in this country are not involved enough, or we are not caring enough. The illusion is one thing, but the reality is our Country is made of people like in this video and they make me proud. I wish I could have been with them.

Clouds Over the Simcoes and Solitude

Back to work after a little "procedure" which pretty much stopped all work for a few days.