Art Journal

I woke up the other day before sunrise and didn't feel sleepy anymore so got up and painted the sunrise out my studio window. The sun comes up so late these days in winter. The "land" portion of the landscape is the street behind our place populated with ordinary houses so not too interesting, but there is a good view of the eastern sky. It was kind of an ordinary sunrise, not one of those spectacular ones that everybody likes to take photos of.

 Morning View, 8 x 10

Here's a painting from last week. The day looked promising but soon the wind kicked in with 50-60 mph gusts making life difficult. Under these conditions using an umbrella for shade became impossible.  It is often advisable to work in shade or use an umbrella since the paint looks much darker inside. The sun directly on the canvas makes the paint appear much lighter than it will appear indoors. I had no shade cover available for this view.  So this is probably darker than I would have liked. I went with an 8x10 due to conditions, which was a good idea because wind chill began to take it's toll after a while. Thank heavens for my electric gloves!

So here's the painting. Open Water, 8 x 10

The water was quite nice.

Here's a painting from east of town, a farm with cornfields and the buildings in the distance.  This was a blustery day so I was working inside the car. I did a painting here a couple winters ago from a farther back distance. This year the furrows were not so noticeable, perhaps they plowed in a different direction or grew a different crop this last summer. At any rate I think the land is for sale or sold so it's future days as a painting site may be numbered.

The earlier painting: