Plein Air Paintings to End Summer and Welcome Autumn

September Field of Trees, oil, 16x20, $500

Path Through the Cedars, oil, 8x10, $200

Headless Scarecrow, oil, 8x10, $200

Some Thoughts on Green

Another summer is coming to an end and that means I've completed another season of studying the color green. Plein air painters often dread this color. It completely dominates the landscape throughout the summer and if not handled correctly the results are a disasterous painting. Ask me how I know this LOL. I keep a little journal with musings about art and life in it. Here's a recent entry anout the color green:

I watch as the clouds form and reform behind the treetops. I study the color of the trees. They're green of course....but no, I look at the green plastic pitcher on the deck. It's bright yellow green. I compare. It's not anywhere to be found in the trees. Only the sunlit grass comes close and even then the red-brown of the earth shows through causing an orange glow beneath the green grass. I look at the deep green of the chair cushions, what we might call forest green, yet I don't see that in the trees either. How is it that this common color of the landscape is so elusive, so un-nameable, and if un-nameable how can I capture it with paint?

How indeed?

Hours of careful observation, and much time spent painting outdoors.