Finishing Touches

An artist learns by repeated trial and error, by an almost moral instinct, to avoid the merely or the confusingly decorative, to eschew violence where it is a fraudulent substitute for power, to say what he has to say with the most direct and economical means, to be true to his objects, to his materials, to his technique, and hence, by a correlated miracle, to himself.

Ezra Pound, Literary Essays

Rising early this Monday morning, I decided to try and finish this piece I began as a demo for a workshop last Saturday. As I looked over the composition, I decided the lower right-hand corner needed more grass and texture work. Then, I decided to build an “action line” leading the eye from the lower right corner up to the barn in a serpentine fashion.

Thanks for reading. I’m ready to start a new one!

 

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On the Road with Wordsworth

Ye blessèd creatures, I have heard the call    

    Ye to each other make; I see          

The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee;  

    My heart is at your festival,             

      My head hath its coronal,

The fulness of your bliss, I feel—I feel it all.

William Wordsworth, “Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood”

As soon as I was free from school Friday, I headed eastbound on I-20 for a 2 1/2 hour drive to the Tyler, Texas vicinity–a small town called Flint.  There, in the facilities of Saint Mary Magdelene Catholic Church, I led an all-day Saturday watercolor workshop.  The first painting posted above was the demo, with all participants observing and practicing the compositional pieces throughout the day: cloud-filled sky, barn, horizon foliage and ground texturing. When the day was done, each of us had a 9 x 12″ watercolor of a barn in a field.

Later that evening, my host and her husband took me to the shores of Lake Palestine just as the sun was setting.  We had ten minutes to kick out a watercolor sketch as we sipped wine, and my attempt is posted below:

Throughout my combined five hours of driving, Friday afternoon and Sunday morning, I drank in the east Texas countryside and felt the shivers of joy I knew as a small boy growing up the first four years alone in Missouri.  Actually, my brother didn’t really become an outdoor playmate until he was about four, so I guess I had eight years of the outdoors to myself growing up with no company except for a vivid imagination.

I drank in that ever-expanding universe that enveloped me as I played in my yard, the garden, and the neighboring pastureland. And while I drove this past weekend, I recalled my childhood questions: is there a person behind those clouds watching me, why are the distant hills blue, and why do trees so far away appear to be no larger than my hand? As I grew older, scientific explanations drove away most of the magic, but not the curiosity and attraction of this world.

The Wordsworth poem flooded my consciousness as I drove home early in the morning. I cannot describe the feeling of overhearing oneself reciting the portion posted above while driving alone through the countryside, but 8:17 Sunday morning marked a sublime feeling of “eudaimonia” as I recited the words aloud, and looked at the sprawling, affirming countryside outside my windsheld.

Thanks for reading.

I paint in order to discover.

I journal when I feel alone.

I blog to remind myself that I am not alone.

Plein Air Watercolor Study of a Barn

Barn Loft

It’s getting late, and I’m fatigued.  I went back out and did another plein air sketch of some of the Eureka Springs cottages, but it is too dark to get a decent photograph of the sketch.  Five of the students gathered with me, and all of us took a shot at watercolor sketching until it got too dark.  Then we just had a fun time visiting on the deck, seated in rocking chairs and enjoying the cool Ozark mountain evening breezes.

Here is the barn I sketched in watercolor this morning, while my students worked on their projects (photos in previous post).  The skies were darkening and threatening rain throughout the morning.  It led to great atmospheric colors (and cooler temperatures).  I wish I could return and give this barn another shot tomorrow, but we’re going to gather in the Eureka Springs historic district and start painting the attractions there.

Thanks for reading.

The Creative Interlude: Cracks between the Paintings

 

Rural Colorado

I am pleased to announce that fifteen of my original works are now posted on the website of the Weiler House Fine Arts Gallery.  I took my most recent three watercolors to the gallery for framing (posted this past week) and, a t the request of Bill Ryan, the proprietor, submitted my JPEG images for the paintings already in the gallery.  If you wish to see them, go to http://www.weilerhousefineart.com

 

Same old tired story–school responsibilities have taken me out of the studio the past two days, and resultantly, this blog died.  But it is Friday morning, and in just a few hours, I will escape to the garage/studio and get something else going (not sure exactly what, but will indeed pick up the brush and resume the enterprise).  I will be posting something this evening to give an account of today’s art endeavors.

Thanks for reading.