Painting in the Beehive

I  have had an agreement with myself for a number of years, and that is that as often as possible,  I’ll paint my watercolors from direct observation.

This commitment arose from a real desire to observe life and react in paint as directly as possible.  To work i situations where everything is moving, the people, the light, and the effect, is an exciting challenge, and pretty much the only way to keep me interested  in watercolor.

Painting on location, being in the beehive,  also has it’s drawbacks…you can make bad decisions in the heat of battle, carry something too far, or lose your objective. But after a while, I believe that you learn  to collect and focus all your facilities, and see/respond to the world in a much more real and vivid way.

King Street Market unfr.

King Street Market 16 x 12″                                                                    Watercolor

The Light Staccato

I can finally put this into “sleep” mode  and let it dry for varnishing.  The whole experience of painting it has been a privilege, really, as well as a continuing part of my education.

When I look back at my intentions, and see the finished painting, it’s not unlike what a parent must feel when they suddenly see their child through detached eyes, see them grown,  mature and independent.   They’ve become something that is part of you, and yet become themselves as well.  This piece is like that. It’s only partly what I anticipated, but perhaps the part that is “itself”  is better than what I had planned, and it’s good that it works that way.  I wouldn’t want full control even if I could get it.

Kailua

untitled, 21 x 27 ” oil on linen

As far as intentions go, I can say that it has the breeziness and movement that I was after, I find that my eye moves through it pretty well, and the color and contrasts are true to the look and the spirit of the place.  It’s got the being-there feeling that I think is the whole point of, well, being there.

My personal sentiments remain the same…I wonder where this painting will be one day, if people will recognize the care that is behind it. Hopefully so.  It may end up anywhere in the world, because you never can tell about these things.  But I’ve had the experience of the work itself, the being-there part. Setting up in the early morning, fighting the wind and the light changes,  meeting the people you will always meet, and rethinking and scraping down difficult passages; the whole bit.  Always wondering, always debating my choices.  The foreground has been reworked four times, I’d guess.  But it works now.

I rebuilt the stretcher bars to a lighter weight, the 4″ ones were too much, and the frame is currently awaiting it’s final finish.  I look forward to seeing it varnished…that’s like the baptism.  That’s when the deal is sealed.

There’s more coming, trust me.  I worked on two studies this morning, which may remain as small pieces, within yards of this place.  I guess it just suits me.

Like chasing the wind

I’ve finished Erik’s portrait.  The sittings, about an hour each day over Spring break, were a wonderful shared experience, but frankly more so for myself than the subject!

Erik was a trooper, but at 14, being painted by your father is not a high priority when compared with all the other things that teenagers have to occupy themselves. And I can agree with that.  However, that being understood, at one point I reminded him of the investement he was making.  It’s not about today, my son. After I’m gone, this will remind you of a sliver of time that has truly passed like the wind.  In hindsight, the time spent sitting will seem like nothing, and that’s when you’ll be really glad we got together on this project.   Trust me.

Erik Portrait Erik at 14 Oil on linen               20 x 16″

Once or twice I thought that the sittings might actually cause him to explode somehow.  Boys aren’t psychically built for posing, not at 14, and I remained pretty sympathetic throughout.  12 minutes on the model stand, 5 minute break was the pattern  Next time, if I can get up to bat again, I’d like to get him playing guitar or something characteristic of his interests.

My goal, to directly create a simple and fresh likeness with as little fussing as possible, is largely realized.  It’ll get signed today, and then we’ll wait a couple months for varnish.  The frame is under construction, a fairly simple 2″ poplar moulding I designed.  I’ll post that when the time comes.

Watercolor Morning

It’s good to break things up with a morning on the Waikiki side for some watercolor work.  Like anywhere one lives, it’s one of those areas that is sort-of off my radar unless I have a specific reason for being there. But it’s beautiful, no doubt, and there is always something to paint as long as you look with your own eyes.  And the weather is almost always something like what I had today.

Here’s this mornings catch…don’t have a title yet, but one will come, as they always do.

Waikiki11 x 14″ watercolor on paper

Nine o’clock shadows…

Quick posting here.

I was out  just after sunup with major winds and overcast conditions.  The canvas was bouncing around like crazy, which only added to the pleasure I took in spending about two more hours carving away at this.  Kept me from getting fussy on the second day.

untitledI should be using my old Anderson easel, but the half-box is (unbelievably) holding it’s own just fine. Wore me out, fighting the wind for that long. The sunlight arrived, giving me a chance to study the greens more closely, along with everything else. I love paint without a medium…it’s harder work, but it’s a solid underpinning, no glare or stickiness.  Big bristle brushes, a Raphael size 22 was one I noticed I used a lot. I want an exciting, developed surface quality, and the canvas seems perfect for what I’m intending.

One newish thing ( it seems new but I’ve been doing it a couple years) is the mixing of all my greens from blues, reds, and yellows.   I think the one and only place outdoors where I still use Viridian is in the ocean.

There’s nothing like it!

Just back from tilting at my windmills this morning at Kailua beach, and it was unbelievably good.

The 22 x 28″ canvas managed to stay planted on the French easel, perhaps not the  optimum choice for such a windy morning.  But I’d scouted a protected position when I did the pencil sketches, and was pretty confident that I’d be okay.

There’s nothing like a lay-in that goes well. It’s like that great date with your spouse- to-be, where you foresee all the great things that are going to happen, and everything seems fresh and clear and possible.  Painterly optimism can soar in this first stage, as it did for me this morning.

The setup was perfect because I like to lay-in a significant painting on an overcast day. Everything is reduced to midtones and nicely flattened, and since lay-in time can be one of the longest of my recurring sessions, an overcast day is good. And I got what I wanted, a cool morning with a smart breeze. After getting in the major preliminary tones, the sun broke through.  Everything lit up, the proverbial scales fell from my eyes, and I could see the path before me, much as I’d  experienced when I selected this spot a week ago. Shadows intensified, colors emerged, people began milling about in the trees in brightly colored beachwear as if they’d risen out of the sand.

Kailuauntitled,  oil on linen  22 x 28″

So, this is now a complete go, and I look forward to tackling it.  I have great hopes, but also enough experience to recognize that in the hours and days to come, that optimism will be tested by disappointments and shortcomings yet to be revealed.

I’ll probably reach a point of  disillusionment where I’ll ask ” What did I see in this place? What am I after?”  (That’s what the pencil sketch helps with).  I’m already skittish about the centrality of those canoes in the painting, but my hope is that, since they aren’t the central subject but merely an incidental shape-part of the whole, I can be forgiven.  In order to get the tree mass on the left where I needed it, something had to give.

I’m hopeful!

Drawing for composition.

I’ve finally gotten two compositional sketches for my next potential painting together.  That business with the tsunami put a hold on things; we who dwell near the sea were directly confronted with how uncertain a place that this world (even in the best and most beautiful of places ) can be at times.  A sobering experience, from which I hope I’ve gained an appreciation of just how blessed we are.

Which is all the more reason to seize the day.  Believe it or not, during those hours when none of us in Hawai’i knew what was going to actually occur, I found myself thinking of the courageous musicians on board the Titanic who, accepting their fate, performed chamber music on deck as she took on water…art revealing it’s significance at a point when mankind’s other devices had failed dramatically.

Of the two rough compositional sketches I’ve completed, I’m showing the one I will pursue.  I’ve learned over the painful years to never commence without the preliminary drawings and groundwork to figure out where I’m heading.  Thanks to all the old painters I’ve been privileged to study…they left behind a pretty clear map of what to do if one is willing to take the time.  That topic gets into a whole “plein air” rant that I’m storing up for a future disgorgement.

Back to the positive:

compositional dwng132b

Kailua beach pencil sketch, 9 x 12″

This painting will be a color piece.  By this, I mean that the delight of the painting is primarily in the color and the subsequent values and shapes.  The color is really exquisite here when the light breaks through, with the dusky orange-greens and strange violet-grays that  the Ironwood trees and their shadows have at this time of day, mid morning. Cool pinks pop about. There’s an aquamarine blue/green in the water that is extraordinary, especially as it’s placed against the warm-colored  light sand.

I’m constantly amazed at the elegance and sophistication of God’s color choices. Combinations of colors reveal themselves that would never occur to me if I hadn’t pursued them through direct observation. Lately (meaning the last couple years!) a blue/violet/orange thing has been happening…who would have thought of it?

But perhaps most exciting to me are that there are also wonderful opportunities for dramatic paint handling and a staccato impressionist light/shade treatment that will reveal forms and movement.  As a composition, it is very rich in that regard, and I hope that I can avoid  allowing the freshness of the vision to get bogged down in “issues”,  other than capturing a joyous and dramatic slice of life.  That’s the point, entirely.

If the weather and light are cooperative, I plan to start tomorrow morning and see if I can lay the painting in.  I have my eye on  an oil-primed linen 22 x 28″ canvas that’s been “aging”  in the studio for many months.  It’s on heavy stretcher bars, which I may replace later…they’re a bit much for that size.

We’ll have to see what tomorrow brings.

Konahua’nui progress…

It’s probably about my sixth outdoor session on this piece, which is not so much considering that it’s a subject that is right in my  neighborhood.  If you can even say that, I suppose, because it’s more like I’m in it’s neighborhood.

It’s going pretty well.  The building process, solid color strokes woven over one another, is working as I hoped it would, and though the going is rather slow, I think it’s a good approach.  Some knife work in the shadows and lights gives a nice variety to the surface, which I’d like to see become richer as I progress.  The foreground area will be getting more attention from here…there’s a beautiful pale green of Cerulean and Cad Lemon that I want to observe when the light is just breaking across the  foreground, and build it in the right value.  There is so much wealth in that area of the painting, I want to make it as interesting as I can.

I’m also very pleased that the linen canvas, one which I primed myself, is performing just as I had hoped.  The frame for this is in production, along with the frame for “Sunlit Surf-Lanai Lookout”,  which should be assembled next week.

Konahua'nui