painting notes B

On Saturday, Sept. 5th, I spoke about 

this piece. Four minutes.

Detail 1

Detail 2

Detail 3

Detail 4

Early layout.

Jungle In The Side Yard, 

acrylic on cradled panel, 24 x 24 inches.

pond painting

 

      Our property has a natural waterway along the southern edge. Many tall trees, some with vines, and with some undergrowth. To the west, our lawn touches a pond that runs the length of the Colborn sub- division. As land was sold, houses have popped up around it. It has a shallow depth and in the summertime is completely covered with duckweed. People ask me how the fishing is. I have no idea. I do not fish. And it is not my pond to manage. For which the geese that frequent our property are grateful. The past three weeks a number of geese have bedded down in the shade, nibbing, and pooping, and not being disturbed by outside visitors.

     I had scouted a handful of scenes in our yard and placed a wooden stump seat by each. So when Thursday morning came I was ready to begin. Suited up, I carefully carried supplies down to the pond. As always, not knowing what would be accomplished. My main objective was to T-R-Y. As it turned out I spent two mornings on the pond piece. And after lunch and a nap, I worked on a second piece of equal size, at another location on the property. This post covers the progress I made over the mornings of Sept. 3rd and 4th.

A stump to sit on. Supplies ready. Blank canvas measured 30 by 40 inches, edged with blue tape.

The palette started out with Utrecht phthalo blue, titanium white, cadmium orange, and crimson alizarin red. From this I mixed the colors I needed. Later I added Hansa Yellow Pale.

Unpacking tripod and EasyL paint kit and paints.

Video is three minutes.

At 10 am the sun began to peek over the tree tops. That was an element I wanted to keep. (detail)

There were trunks standing in the water. (detail)
A lovely reddish dirt bank curving toward me on the left side.

And a swarm of small yellow pond flowers with orange stems and green leaves at my feet. A simple blue wash for that. (detail)

At 12:30 Thursday midday I stopped as the light had changed significantly.

    The next morning (Friday) I got up earlier and began at 7:00 am. I wanted to work on areas in the shade. The surface on the pond was questionable. I liked an sunlight on the left side of the middle trees near the bank, but I did not want scattered sunlight to the right. It was as you see in the above detail, all over the place. It would obscure the elements I wanted to showcase. See next detail. I removed the sunlight patterns my eye was seeing.

Next detail, off to the far left, the lawn grass was as green and vibrant as ever. Darker colors helped subdue their brilliance.

Where the trees meet the front yard was a problem. I wanted the eyes looking in the backyard, where my design was. So I darkened the edge. Compare next two details, before and after.

 

Above detail, I brought blues down into the flower area. Dotted yellow, orange green stem swoops, and some greens that I used elsewhere in the painting. That was one reason I got up earlier. To see what the flower patch looked like in the shade. Next detail. Double click to see enlarged.

This photo of the flowers showed its denseness. My version suggests what my eye was seeing. The color decisions are more valuable than the quantity of plants. The kind of yellow, the orange-green swoops, the strong blues, these make the flower area a part of the whole painting. The same colors need to be distributed in brush strokes throughout the painting. That is what gives the whole painting "harmony."

Nine minutes.

and then

 

 and then 

and then

The sun peeking over the tree tops was kept. White titanium sunburst. An off-white mixed-blue diffuses off to the left and the right. The way the tops of the tree clusters taper down to the sides and the way the sunburst is central at the top was intentional.

The reddish dirt bank was tricky. The colors on either side of the bank made it too blue or too purpley. It took some doing to make it reddish.
The eye goes to the sun patch and follows the bank on the left side forward to the flower patch. The secondary sun patterns also draw the eye forward to the patch.

Hoping only to work for an hour stretched into two and then three hours. Soon it was 10:00 am and the sun peeked over the tree tops. Now was the time to wrap it up. Keep the elements I wanted.

     The surface of the pond to the middle and right needed to be de-emphasized. Made uninteresting. I mixed a blue gray. It wasn't until the next day, and my wife pointed it out, that I realized what that gray shape did to the whole design. It helped create depth. It divided the pond to a far side and a near side. See next detail. It was not my intention, but I am going to keep it for now.

What I have so far, next image. Letting it breathe.

Me getting used to it. Okay with what I have.

This shows the painting on a wall in our house, next.

painting notes A

For two days I painted outside in my backyard last month. Thursday and Friday, August 20 and 21. My favorite drink by my side. Lemonade, honey, and siracha mixed in hot water. Mmmmm.

Detail of ivy, right.









Detail of limbs, left.

 Two days set aside to work on it.

Detail of flowers.

ABOVE, detail of myself painting. I used a mirror to render it. Actually, the heavy quarter-inch bedroom mirror fell over outside and cracked into itty-bitty shards. It was carefully gathered and put in the trash can. Bye bye heirloom. Bought a four dollar replacement from Shopko. Ha.

The arching tree with ivy. A tall viney tree at the edge on my yard. A bed of flowers.




Below, notice lake added to background.

Canvas measures 24 by 30 inches.

(Double click to see images enlarged)

On Saturday, Sept 5th, I spoke about this piece.

Video is eight minutes.

school skills

O Lord, you are my strength and my shield. You bring me joy in pleasant ways. I sing your praise.

There is a delight when a student thinks for himself and formulates an answer, a guess, a hunch. The thinking through and voicing of her thought. This came Friday morning with my third graders. We had completed our six brain gym exercises, and time remained for a motion puzzle. I held out a large rectangular chunky looking tray to each in the group. What did they suppose was the tray was made of? Was is wood? No. Was it metal? No. One guessed, paper. Was it heavy? They held it with both hands. No, it was light. Then I continued, I had found this Styrofoam packing material left out for the janitor to discard. It had once been around a computer unit. I thought maybe it could be used here in our room. (I brought out the plastic golf ball from my jacket pocket, and placed it in the inside the tray.) I wondered whether you could figure it out. (Taking hold off the tray on both ends with my hands, I tilted the tray so that the ball would roll down one side and across the side closest to me. Just enough to plant the idea. We had been trying various forms of ball rolling back and forth on a cardboard track. See http://motionpuzzles.blogspot.com/2011/10/back-and-forth.html)

Each student took three minutes to try their skill at making the ball run down all four sides of the tray in a circular fashion. In the middle of the tray there were two large preformed holes. Every student experienced the ball falling through the tray to the floor, bouncing under a table to retrieve on hands and knees. It was not as easy as it appeared. Two students chose to sit down instead of standing to complete the two loops. I thanked each for trying this exercise out for me. Some began coming up with names for the puzzle. The joy of the Lord enveloped my heart.

Friday afternoon at BMP I listened to a third grader read. Sounding out words you do not know is WORK and takes much COURAGE. Following the story with my eyes as he read, I could interject the right pronunciation of a word after he tried it himself first. The sentences came together in a halting fashion. Start stop start stop. Instead of gibberish, the story actually meant something and could be understood by both of us. After he finished the chapter we looked at the book illustrations and talked about the silk weaver woman, what an ox looked like, what the wooden cart looked like, and the pointed to the major characters by name. After completing the assignment, the student was delighted and in a pleasant mood. The joy of the Lord snuck into my heart and made my spirit soar.

You make my path straight. You bring me your joy in unexpected ways. How sweet you are. How gentle and kind.