Demo in Brenham..

Today, I did a demo at the Brenham Art League... I came prepared to do a portrait demo in 1 hour with oils using quick studies techniques.  I gave the attendees the choice of what I would paint and they chose a photo of a small dog in the desert...  During the process, I answered questions about colors, approaches, and materials.  It was a good group of painters and everyone was interested in the process.  

 I used a photo of my own dog, Rosey, from several years ago when we were visiting friends in Albuquerque.  This is one of my favorite pictures of Rosey, who loves the sun, worships it even, and was so alive and happy in this picture.

 

And, here is the painting... Done in 50 minutes.............

 

Plein Air Painting with Maren Phillips - Part 1

How cool that one of my students posted this on You Tube of me starting to work on my demo painting during my plein air workshop today!  How fun!!

Fun in Waxahachie!!

Five days of painting, nine paintings total, and lots of new friends and even a couple of sales!  That was May 28th through June 2 in Waxahachie, Texas.  Waxahachie is a small town in North Central Texas, off Interstate 35E, about 50 miles south of Dallas.  If you pass through that area, it would be worth your while to stop for a visit, even a few days, in Waxahachie.  They are renowned for the lovely turn of the century Gingerbread Homes in the historical district.  The townspeople seem to value their resources and take care to renovate and restore their older historical buildings.  When I was there, it was in conjunction with the Ellis County Arts Association and the Gingerbread Homes Tour, for the Paint Historic Waxahachie event.  There were over 30 artists painting over a week long period.  The arts group provided goodies, and directions, and a wonderful venue for display of the wet paintings to the townspeople. 

Here is one of the paintings I did during the competition period of the week.  I had spied this home as I first came into town, did a doubletake and planned right then to paint it.  The only thing I needed was the right light.  We had mostly cloudy and sprinkly weather for several days, but as it happened, there were just the right amount of sunbeams which broke thru as I was working on this painting.  I am including several in process pics so you get an idea of my journey.  This painting won an honorable mention in the competition with over 200 pieces of work!

Here is the photo of the home during one of the sunny moments!
And here is the first stage of my painting, the toned canvas and the sketch for the painting...

Stage two, a block in of large color areas and masses of darks.... establishing values...

 

Stage 3 as I begin to establish mid tones and a bit of detail...  at this stage, I had painted for approximately 90 minutes...

Stage 4 continues the addition of more values, more color in the landscape and greater refinement of the details in the house.  I also began work on the fountain in the foreground...

Stage 5 finds me mostly finished with the painting, with only a few tweaks to finish details and checking darks and lights to make sure they are well placed and balanced....

 

And here is the finished painting, framed, and with it's winning ribbon!