Two Cedars

Another opportunity to paint blue snow shadows. This was painted yesterday from my studio window before I went to the hospital for my evening shift in ICU. The days are very short this time of year as it gets dark by five in the afternoon, which is, of course not good for painting, but what is good for painting is the low raking sunlight which lights the winter mornings and afternoons.

Winter - SOLD

What a gorgeous day! Blue sky and sunshine everwhere, the snow is so beautiful when the trees cast blue snow shadows everywhere. This little sketch was painted looking out of our music room window towards the road.

The Hardwood Forest

This was a particularily grey day last week but Marina and I were determined to paint an outdoor motif. We happily sat at her kitchen table drinking tea and painting, despite not having any brilliant colours to paint.

Perched Pear

I found this glass bowl at Walmart last week when I went to finish my Christmas shopping after my evening shift at the hospital. My friend Marina bought a similiar bowl when we went to Walmart in Ogdensburg on our way home from our Carol Marine painting course in New York this summer, and I have been wanting one ever since. The pears were fun to do and I love to use red. The top pear is resting on the rim of the bowl but I thought it looked like it was precarioulsy pearched on the bottom pear.

The Little Spruce

This is a view of our back lawn from the kitchen window. I waited all day for some sunshine so that I could paint some blue shadows on the snow. The sun shone briefly, about 2 minutes, so I painted the long tree shadows first and then extrapolated some of the background shadows to the best of my knowledge. I love this time of year when the snow is fresh and pristine, forms become simpler and designs more apparent making composition easier.

Early December

This small oil sketch was done this afternoon from my back deck. It was below freezing but with the sun shining it was warm enough for Phil and I to sit on our back steps and drink our tea after lunch. I figured if it is warm enough to sit and drink tea it surely is warm enough to do a small painting. Unfortunately, the clouds started to roll in from the east and south and just as I was ready to start painting, the clouds covered the sun and I lost all the beautiful blue shadows on the snow. I persevered even though it got very cold without the sunshine and was pretty happy with this little piece.

Snow on Sunflowers

The first snow was fairly light but covered the garden and the lawn. The tall stalks of the sunflowers and hollyhocks looked so elegant with tufts of snow clinging to their heads. Marina came over and we sat at my kitchen table and painted these looking through the windows.

Oranges in a Glass Bowl

This is the painting that I did last week when I went to Marina's place. We had only a short time as usual and had lots to share. She told me all about her painting experiences with Ian Roberts in South Carolina and the good times they had. We look forward to lots of painting this winter and maybe even some more pleine aire if we get some days that are not to cold.

White Pines

This is the last of the plein aire oil sketches that I painted during our "Indian Summer" last week. I have not been able to get to my blog for a while but I did manage to paint last week with my friend Marina. I have to photograph the still life that we did together and post it. The above piece has some glare on the left side so I will try to correct that also.

Track into the Woods

A few hundred feet from our house is a beautiful property that runs into the bush. It used to be part of a farm and someone still cuts hay from the fields, which is great for me because it provides easy access to some great painting places. I painted this last week during our wonderful "Indian Summer". It was cold out when I did this sketch but I had such a great time because the fall grasses were so beautiful and the late afternoon November light is so fine for painting.

Close to Home

Last week when my husband, Phil, was up on the roof doing some repairs I was below on the lawn being the "ground man/gofer". I knew Phil was going to be quite a while up on the roof so I set up in the front yard looking in to the bush for this view of some of our trees. It was a great day, I enjoyed painting and Phil did a great job on the roof repairs.

Late Afternoon

This is another small panel painted the same day as the previous piece, later in the afternoon, finished just as the sun was dropping below the tree line. The sky was a warm, mellow, yellow-green and I really loved the shapes of the trees against the backdrop of the sky. It was unbelievable how cold it got in just a few minutes after the sun set.

Twin Tamaracks

I was able to get out and paint quite a few times in the past week and a half. The November light is really fantastic and the colours are so subtle and interesting. I love all the shades of the grasses and tree branches which are not so visible when they are covered with leaves. Because it was pretty cold some of the days when I was out I used smaller panels which work up a lot faster than the 8 x 10's that I used most of the summer.

Green Roof

A quick little sketch on a piece of pink matboard I did as a study for a larger painting "Sumachs". Another in the ongoing series of paintings done on the abandoned farm down the road from our house.

Farm Building in November

This year summer change to autumn overnight, one day it was hot and the next it was cold without too much moderate weather in between. All of the buildings on this abandoned farm property have the most beautiful weathered green steel/tin roofs, which I love to paint against the constantly changing seasons. I hope to go out again this week to paint on the farm if it is not to cold and the sun shines for a bit.

White Cup #3

Another look at the White Cup. I have painted about 11 different studies of this object and I like this one about the best of the last 10, it is loose and painted quickly.

Tangerine

After taking Carol Marine's workshop this summer in New York state I really understand the need to be able to draw quickly and accurately, something that I cannot yet do. I painted 4 small paintings of this subject before I started the 'final' one, each of the 4 preliminary studies revealed some more subtle aspect of the subject, making the final painting flow more easily. I am going to spend much more time this fall and winter working on my drawing skills.

Red Delicious

A quick sketch at Marina's a few weeks ago

Piggy Bank

This little piggy I painted a while ago with my friend Marina and I never posted it. It was a fun afternoon and we did a couple of versions of this delft ceramic bank that my mom gave me a few years ago.

Grey Day with Poplars

Marina and I drove around to some of our favorite painting spots but could not get inspired, the day was grey with rain coming in. Finally we turned down onto Schoolhouse Road to look for a spot that we had thought we would come back to one day. The sky was now completely overcast except a thin line of sky to the east which was bright yellow/coral. The bright line of the sky and the brilliant poplars which seemed to glow with light from within gave us the inspiration for the paintings. By the time we were finished it had started to rain. Undaunted we sat in the car and drank a cup of hot tea and felt our day most enjoyable and successful.

The Guardians

I am trying to keep my paintings loose, describing large colour areas and focusing on design rather than detail. This is much harder than it sounds. When standing outside in nature your eyes take in a million subtle changes in colour and value and it is so easy to zone in on one small area of the painting and keep working there. I find the discipline required to keep it big and keep it loose usually breaks down as I get more tired at the end of the day.

On the Way to Mattawa

This little sketch was painted on the day Marina and I went on our road trip to Mattawa. A lake lies beside Highway 17, with a small park with picnic tables, where travellers can get out of their cars and gamble about enjoying the beautiful natural world. We met a dog called Mary which I thought was cool.

Between the Showers

On the day this was painted rain showers rolled in one after the other all afternoon. It was a beautiful day between, and I did manage to almost finish this sketch before I got rained on.

The Poplars

After a very intense day yesterday painting at Crooked Slide Falls near Combermere Marina and I painted nearer to home off one of the small gravel roads in Laurentian Valley. We had only a short time to paint and so had to get things down quickly. I think we were both exhausted but because we had not been able to get out to paint lately we were determined to make our best effort. I had to make a few changes, actually I scraped the poplars off and repainted them completely painting lots of blue sky holes, in my studio that evening.

Slough on Forest Lea Road

Between the rain and the abyssmal featureless overcast conditions of the past seven days I managed to get out and paint a couple of times. On the day I paintined this sketch I drove a few miles from my house down Forest Lea Road into the bush and set up Marina's Solteck easel which she has lent to me while she is in Germany, and painted looking north across a slough. The colours are beautiful and so inspiring, I had a wonderful time while painting this piece, does it show?