Monday 30 July 2012

dock - mid step - 24x20"


Not the best photo as it is inky dark outside right now..............we have had amazing tropical thunderstorms every afternoon for over a week. Since I have been working on this a lot, I figured I would post it. I have simplified several areas and removed things that did not add to the composition.

Thursday 26 July 2012

gray's hill landing - 10x10 plein air study


Gray's Hill is an area west of Beaufort and, despite its name, I have yet to find a hill. It is a very nice place to paint - I stood right on the floating landing and caught some blue crabs while painting. This was done weeks ago before it became hot and humid (it was just hot then). I have been pretty much working inside this week and have had an abscessed tooth so I have been less than productive. After a trip to the dentist and some prescriptions I am starting to feel better - cannot wait for my root canal in ten days!

Saturday 21 July 2012

dock at Gay Fish - 24x20" - beginning


I have just begun this and it's large so it may take me a bit of time. The heat here has been pretty constant and I find that if I don't go out really early to paint, I tend to work inside............kind of the the opposite of winter in New England. I love the heat and humidity but by 1 pm it is probably not wise to spend hours in the hot sun painting...........plus, I totally hate sweat in my eyes and no matter what I wear as a sweatband, the salty stuff pours in after I have been out there even briefly. Gay Fish is this awesome place to buy shrimp - in fact it was featured in the movie "Forrest Gump"- I buy shrimp there every week and find it completely captivating to paint.

Tuesday 17 July 2012

hot day in the fields - 16x8"


St. Helena Island is east of Beaufort towards the open ocean; there are quite a few large farms there. I have a huge regard for the farmworkers that work in the humid heat and hot sun of the South Carolina summer. I chanced on this scene on the way back from painting at one of the boat landings and managed to get a photo. While working on it I discovered that just because the scene was so bright and intense, it wasn't terribly light in value. Oh, and an anniversary of sorts...............today is my 600th post!

Thursday 12 July 2012

on the intracoastal - 14x11"


I found a good spot along the canal right downtown near the bridge to the Sea Islands and painted this today. I had intended on finishing a different painting that I started on Monday but promptly ruined it......sometimes it just doesn't work out to do a study over the course of two days.

Wednesday 11 July 2012

little house in the trees - plein air on paper - 10x8"


Last year I bought a bunch of brown card style paper from Guerilla Painters, put it in the backpack that I use for outdoor painting and then forgot to use it. I finally remembered to add some masking tape to the pack so I could tape the paper to a panel - I decided to use it today. The paper takes a little getting used to because it is somewhat absorbent but I adjusted pretty quickly and enjoyed the experience. You can't really see just what I was looking at in this photo but for some reason I thought having some background might be neat. Plus, a wet painting on paper is pretty hard to put anywhere to take a photo!

Friday 6 July 2012

beginning of "historic house" - 12" square


This is just the beginning of this painting......I am roughing it out. Beaufort has many amazing historic homes but many of them are located in very "close" enviornments which do not allow one to get back far enough to get any perspective or distance from them without stepping in the intra-coastal canal or  onto a neighbor's porch. In this case I have found the distortion of the camera lens to be helpful. I usually become annoyed by the distortion and rarely rely on photos of the landscape I have just painted, prefering to return to the site if I need to do so.

Wednesday 4 July 2012

Happy Fourth to all


 I realized when organizing photos that I had never posted this painting completed.............so, here it is.

Monday 2 July 2012

feeding gulls & crabbing


It remains quite hot here but I did go out to paint this morning at the landing near my house.....I discovered that catching blue crabs is the perfect compliment to plein air painting. I got 7 crabs and was so excited I felt like I was eight again - they were all a bit small so I threw them back but it was still fun. I ended up wiping down the painting I did and came home to finish this. While I was there a man was netting for shrimp so I think I'll have to learn about that too. That wouldn't work so well with painting since it isn't as passive.........with the crabbing, all you do is drop the net over the edge of the dock and wait (something that would drive me crazy if I didn't have something active to do while waiting). I am hoping to get some big ones soon!