Ed Buonvecchio Archives | Page 2 of 3

June 29, 2017

Slightly sloshy artist gets soaked

The only thing you can predict with certainty about this summer’s weather is that it will rain.

Just slightly soaked, I try again. Photo courtesy of Annette Koziel

Fishermen’s Memorial Park sits above the lobster fleet in Boothbay Harbor. It’s a sobering memorial; the list of lives lost at sea is long and a fresh wreath hangs on its bronze dory. Behind the park rises the uncompromising white frame spire of Our Lady Queen of Peace Catholic Church, celebrating its centenary this year. Its vaulted ceiling is reminiscent of the ribs of the Ernestina-Morrisey, currently laid open in Boothbay’s shipyard. On the hour, Our Lady’s carillon peals earnest hymns across the water.

Our Lady of Peace Catholic Church.

Bobbi Heath, Ed Buonvecchio and I were meeting to demo for Windjammer Days. We’d planned to grab lunch in town and then paint at the Fire Hall, where a tent was set up for our convenience. However, we’re landscape painters. The best view of all was from the park and the church.

Clearly, everyone else thought so too. The place was mobbed. Late in the morning, one of my students, Jennifer Johnson, stopped by. We were just coming to grips with the idea that we couldn’t leave to get something to eat. Jennifer kindly volunteered to fetch our lunches. The restaurant was closed, so she brought us fresh vegetarian chili made with her own two hands. That, friends, is ‘supporting the arts.’

American Eagle, a tug, and an antique launch… clearly the best view in town.

“It’s going to be a great day,” Jennifer promised me. “No rain on the forecast.” Radar agreed with her. Large fluffy clouds marched in from the west. Our displays of work were set up, we were surrounded by interested people asking intelligent questions, and below us paraded a motley collection of fantastic winged angels, the windjammers for which the festival is named.

A young lad named Ben positioned himself next to me, trying to name the boats as they came in. “It’s just like identifying cars,” I told him. “You figure out the model from its shape and its details. Does it have a topsail? A bowsprit? A racing stripe?”

My sketch. The tide was on the turn, so the boats were swinging.

He was fascinated by the privateer Lynx. It’s an interpretation of an historic privateer built in 1812 to run British naval blockades. Its masts are severely raked, meaning they tilt. This term gives us the modern word rakish.

The boats and their adoring fans moved on. Ropy fingers of moisture started to spill down from the friendly cumulus clouds. “It’s raining there, there, and there,” I said to Ed and Bobbi. We’d barely repacked our gallery when the skies let loose.

Rain, again.

Annette Koziel, a friend and fan from Brunswick, arrived with the rain. She had a tarp in her car. We tossed it over my easel and ran for Bobbi’s car. Artists know that if Nature throws a passing shower, you use the break to find a bathroom.

At the Lobster Dock.

It stopped as quickly as it started. I mopped up and tried again. I picked up my brush and a second shower poured down. I can take a hint, I thought.

Lobster boats at Boothbay (unfinished) by Carol L. Douglas

I had an errand to run in Brunswick, so I headed south, taking me across the giant parking lot that is the Wiscasset bridge. Generally, I do sums in my head when I need to stay alert while driving, but Annette gave me a great tip. A small radio station broadcasts quirky, mid-century standards from an old tidal mill in West Bath. If you’re traveling up Route 1, try tuning your radio to 98.3.

Later, I heard from Jennifer. She was so sure it wouldn’t rain that she left her windows open while she ran in the grocery store. Now, that’s adventurous.

June 20, 2017

That vexing exchange rate question

In every important way, Canadians and Americans are indistinguishable. That artificial barrier, the border, makes our common life hard.

Poppy Balser’s weir painting sold at the opening bell.

In 2012, the Canadian and US dollars were trading at close to par. Today, one Canadian dollar is worth just three bits (and a penny, but Canada no longer uses the penny). This isn’t the historical worst it’s been, but it’s close enough for discomfort.

The US dollar has also been weakening, but the Loonie has lagged even more. For both economies, this is in part because of central bank policies and in part because oil prices are down.

I benefited from the weak Canadian dollar when I crossed Canada last fall. The same dollar disparity hurt when I was trying to sell work in Canada.

Ed Buonvecchio painted the Cape D’or lighthouse. My photo doesn’t do the painting justice.

We’d been told to price our work as usual by juror Bill Rogers. Even if he hadn’t said it, it’s my usual practice. It’s unfair to collectors and galleries to hop around when you price your work.

I was unsure how to apply the exchange rate. I ended up leaving the work at its American tag price. Even that was too expensive. There were five American artists in the festival. We were terrifically expensive compared to our Canadian peers.

My painting of the Parrsboro light was distinctively Nova Scotian; I wanted to sell it there. I dropped it to half its American price. It sold for $400.

From that, the venue takes 40%. This is a legitimate commission, and one every serious artist is happy to pay. That leaves me with a check for $240.

Mary Sheehan Winn painted Partridge Island.

But wait, there’s more. My bank is going to convert that and, assuming there are no additional currency fees, I will take home $181.25.

I know just enough about economics to understand that a strong American dollar hurts exports; a weak dollar helps exports. Growing up on the Niagara Frontier, I know there were years we went to Canada for gas and other years when Canadians came to the US to shop.

But I’ve never understood the exchange rate so personally.

Rockies at Canmore, Alberta. Christopher Gorey, of Ingonish, Nova Scotia, is a new painter to me. This wasn’t his festival piece, but it’s a good example of his great touch with watercolor.

There was another disparity in pricing, one that affected only Canadian artists. Artists who sell more than $30,000 per year are required to collect something called the HST, or Harmonized Sales Tax. They have to tack 15% on to the ticket price of their work.

The only time American artists collect sales tax is when we sell paintings directly to collectors. When paintings are sold through events or galleries, it’s the venue’s responsibility. The Canadian system would take some getting used to.

Marc Grandbois of L’Anse -St- Jean, Quebec City, is another painter I will keep track of. He caught the lowering sky over Two Islands beautifully.

Those of us who live along the border understand that in every important way, Canadians and Americans are indistinguishable. We have the same values, argue over the same disagreements, love the same landscape, drink the same coffee, shop at the same big-box stores, and (generally) speak the same language. NAFTA was supposed to make trading between us easier. In fact, between heightened border security and the disparity of our dollars, it’s harder than ever.

A pity, that.

June 19, 2017

Fickle Mother Nature

Style is a transitory and inconsequential factor, if one can turn it on and off at will.

Lonely Lighthouse, by Carol L. Douglas

I haven’t painted in that much rain since a memorable weekend at Rye’s Painters on Location with Brad Marshall, where we labored in the tail end of a hurricane. All the best planning won’t save you from low light and rain that blows in sideways under your umbrella. One solution is to paint from your car, but my Prius is too small for one artist, let alone two.

Sometimes, projected rain and fog fails to materialize along the coast. It gets sidetracked by the myriad cliffs, points, headlands and capes. That didn’t happen this weekend. The light was low and flat, and the lovely headlands danced and disappeared into the fog.

Ed Buonvecchio and I were up with first light on Friday to be on our way to Advocate Harbour. A mackerel sky was forming over Cape D’or. That’s a better sign of incipient rain than my arthritis.

They wrested their living from the sea (Advocate Harbour), by Carol L. Douglas

This small fishing village by the sea is characteristic of the old North Atlantic coast. We set up in the cemetery. The nearest tombstone to my easel memorialized two members of the same family, lost at sea in 1966. Going to the ocean to work is probably less dangerous today with modern navigation and communication tools, but the North Atlantic is a powerful and fickle mistress.

Later, I chatted for a few minutes with the owner of the herring weir at Partridge Island. He and his crew still tend the nets and harvest the fish with dipping nets. It’s pretty much a lost technology: there are some weirs at Grand Manan and Digby, but most of them are gone. Call me a Luddite if you want, but what value is there in automating work so that some men labor in solitude and others can’t find jobs?

Cape Blomidon makes its own cloud, by Carol L. Douglas

By mid-day Friday, we had lost our light. Poppy Balser, Ed and I trekked out to Cape D’or and did the “money shot,” but it didn’t move me. There was no sparkle in the water, and no light on the cliffs. I wish I’d painted the rhubarb growing by the lighthouse instead. Neither Poppy nor I submitted our paintings of the cliffs.

The next morning, we tried the overlook at Two Islands. I got a passible painting from it, even though my paint was emulsifying in the blowing rain. Eventually I squelched over to where Ed was set up. “I’m only here because of you,” he told me.

“That’s funny. I’m only here because of you,” I answered. Despite my rain gear, I was soaked down to my step-ins.

We removed to town and the porch of Ottawa House to finish the day. The volunteers offered us tea and cookies and the opportunity to paint indoors.

This hospitality has been true all over Parrsboro. Canadians are, in general, nice and helpful people. Since their dollar is weak compared to ours, you might think about vacationing there this summer.

Two Islands in the rain, by Carol L. Douglas

I’d had my eye on Cape Blomidon for hours, watching a standing hammer-shaped cloud forming off its tip. Volunteer Ed Gilbert told me that this cloud often forms above the cape in bad weather. “Blomiden” is a corruption of Blow-Me-Down, so named because the hot and cold air masses meet there and turn on hapless navigators.

The Quick Draw started in mist and fog, although true rain never really materialized on Sunday. I’d decided to paint with nothing smaller than an #12 round, since it was clear the juror liked that look. That paid off with a second-place ribbon.

We always feel badly if we don’t win prizes at these events, but often the awards have nothing to do with ability or insight and everything to do with style. I like “bold brush” painting as much as the next guy, but it’s not always conducive to describing the world, which is my primary objective. That I could switch it up to win a ribbon is an indication of just how transitory and inconsequential “style” is as a concept.

“I wish I could stay another day,” Ed texted me last night. The sky was clearing, and Cape Blomidon danced in the blue, shimmering light. But Maine is calling us back.

June 16, 2017

And we’re off

The locals were eager to share their million-dollar views and, by the way, did we need a washroom?

Ed and I did multiple value studies trying to sort out our painting sites for today.

The Canadian Maritimes shipbuilding industry dates to 1606, when two small boats were built at Port Royal. The availability of timber and proximity to the sea meant that by the nineteenth century, Nova Scotia’s shipyards were recognized worldwide.

There’s no sign of this boatbuilding industry left today, but Parrsboro built 10 barks, 2 barkentines, 11 brigs, 187 schooners, 1 full-rigged ship, and 41 brigantines. How do I know? At four in the afternoon, while I was sorting photos on my computer, Ed Buonvecchio was reading Parrsboro history.

Meanwhile, Poppy Balser was sitting on a stoop Instagramming and Mary Sheehan Winn was drafting a lobster boat. We were scattered along the harbor but linked by our cell phones.

Ed and I spent the morning doing value studies of possible locations. Because we’re in one car, we needed to agree on our final locations, without a lot of last-minute discussion. We listed the possibilities and then each listed them in order of priority. Our lists ended up being very nearly identical. In the end only one question remained: should we choose the Two Island overlook with the blue roof or the red roof?

Nova Scotians are very friendly. Several stopped to chat as we worked. Inevitably, they suggested that they, in fact, had a better view from their back deck. And, by the way, did we need a washroom?

At one point, I tossed my keys to Ed and took off with a stranger in his Ford F-150, which is the official truck of Canada. I wasn’t overly worried. He’d mentioned that he’d met his hero, George Herbert Walker Bush, several times. A man with such taste had to be trustworthy. He turned out to be charming and witty, and I returned to his property several times, to show it to Poppy and Ed in succession.

Thanks to Mary and her local connections, I’ve learned a lot about Parrsboro in two short days. In addition to her living relatives, she’s related to someone in every cemetery in town. “Aw, hello, Uncle Remus!” she would exclaim as we passed an old burying ground. “Hello, Cousin Louise!” At one point, she jumped from the car and tore crosslots looking for a grave. She caught up with me at the bottom of the hill, breathless. “That was easier than I expected,” she puffed.

That insider information made me smug. “Poppy,” I said when she arrived, “I know absolutely everything.”

“Do you know where the weir is?” she challenged. Fishing weirs are an ancient technology for catching tidal fish, dating back to prehistory. They’re dying out now, but Poppy is a master at painting them. And Parrsboro has one, just across the water from Parrsboro’s hypermodern tidal turbine, which unfortunately failed under the enormous hydraulic pressures of the Bay of Fundy and is being rebuilt this spring.

After we visited the weir, we took off at breakneck speed. I had less than three hours to show her all the sights before we were expected for the opening festivities. We were so short of time that I changed my shirt in the parking lot of the Cape D’or Lighthouse. It was so desolate that I could have had a sponge bath with nobody noticing.

We arrived back in Parrsboro with enough time to wash our faces and hands and scurry in to our appointment. By the time you read this, we’ll be out in Port Greville painting. Can you tell I’m excited?

June 14, 2017

Homeland insecurity

I’m not a very good liar, and the US-Canada border crossing is no place to hone my skills.

Ed Buonvecchio is looking forward to seeing the uniquely Fundy method of ditching boats.

Several years ago, I was crossing back to the US from Ontario with several of my painting students. One of them caught the eye of Homeland Security. The rest of us cooled our heels in a badly-lighted waiting room while Jennifer convinced two border officers that she is an utterly blameless citizen.

Jennifer is chirpy about most things, even an unscheduled brush with law enforcement. “Those young men were cute!” she twanged in her Virginia accent. “Ah didn’t mind spending half the night with them at all.”

Yesterday, I traveled to Canada with Ed Buonvecchio. Ed and I make up 2/3s of the Maine contingent to the Parrsboro International Plein Air Festival. He’s just come back from another long road trip. He’s tired.

Pink seas at Parrsboro, earlier this year.

Perhaps it’s my grandmotherly good looks, but I usually have no problems crossing borders. However, I’ve been mindful about it ever since Poppy Balser was stopped coming into the US for Castine Plein Air in 2016. The question that tripped her up was, “Are you going to be selling any work?”

The accurate answer yesterday was that we are not going to sell work directly, but the festival’s organizers, Parrsboro Creative, would be doing so.

I’m not a very good liar. That doesn’t mean I’m honest; it just means that I don’t do it well. I don’t volunteer information, but it’s pointless for me to try to dissemble. A child would know I was telling a fib. Ed is, if anything, even worse.

It turns out that Ed, like my friend Jennifer, was flagged on the background check. We cooled our heels in a beautiful, airy, tiled building. Ed answered questions and fretted. I paced, trying to catch up with my husband on our Fitbit challenge.

Cobequid Bay farm, by Carol L. Douglas. I last painted up here, oh, about three weeks ago.

In the end, I’m like my pal Jennifer, always looking for the silver lining. I learned something important: it’s OK for American artists to work in Canada as long as our tools are worth less than a certain dollar amount. We can also bring in materials and supplies, as long as they’re worth less than a certain dollar amount. I haven’t found the magic numbers, but I figured our easels and brushes were probably worth less than $150 each, and our supplies under $100 each. (Those numbers may seem low, but these are pretty well-used items.)

I’m looking forward to painting with Poppy Balser again.

I’m relieved. That means we don’t have to try to pass ourselves off as amateurs when we cross over with our paints, brushes and canvases. That’s just easier on everyone, artists and customs inspectors alike.

“Ed,” I said in my biting Western New York accent, “That young man was cute! I didn’t mind spending time with him at all.”

Ed just rolled his eyes.

—-

Addendum: I have no internet here, so my posts may be erratic for the rest of the week.

June 13, 2017

You call this working?

For me, serious illness was a corrective to the impulse to tiptoe around my calling. It reminded me that time is precious and fleeting.

As I tried to figure out how my carefully-planned day went so haywire, a friend pointed out, “you hate packing and you love boats.” That is the only explanation for giving up what I absolutely had to do in order to join Howard Gallagher and Ken DeWaard on the Dirty Dory.

Camden is full of beautiful boats. It’s easy enough to find opportunities to paint them at rest. It’s much more difficult to see them under sail. I have a few photos from last year’s trip on American Eagle. Two years ago, Howard took the late Lee Boynton and me out to see the start of the Eggemoggin Reach Regatta. We shot pictures of modern boats. But opportunities to shoot the massive old schooners under way are limited, and I should grab them when I can.

Mercantile raising her sails.

It takes a skilled navigator to get in position while not annoying the schooner crew, and Howard is that. Here’s the video he shot while we were out:

One of the boats we followed out was the ketch Angelique. She is distinctive for her brown-rose tan-barked sails. In 2016, Poppy Balser and I sketched her as she stood off Castine in a harbor that already hosted Bowdoinand J&E Riggin. It was a magical morning but eventually I finished and left. Poppy stayed; Angelique docked; Poppy scored. Timing, as they say, is everything.

Angelique at the Dock, watercolor, by Poppy Balser.

The same was true yesterday. I returned to my studio to frame and photograph paintings and clean and pack my car. Ed Buonvecchio called; we chatted about the recent Finger Lakes Plein Air Festival. Kari Ganoung Ruiz, who won Best in Show, is a friend and a fellow member of Greater Rochester Plein Air Painters. She was my monitor for my 2015 Sea and Sky workshop. Kudos to a fine, fine painter.

Ed and I are heading to Nova Scotia this afternoon to paint in the Parrsboro International Plein Air Festival. I was there earlier this year with Bobbi Heath. The landscape is spectacular and I’m expecting great things to happen.

Angelique leaving Camden harbor.

This three-day event is full of meet-and-greet events, more than this old recluse is accustomed to. The culmination is a Collector’s Gala on Saturday night. I’m a little anxious at its posh description. Oh, well. One bright side to owning only one dress is that one doesn’t need to dither about what to wear. No, I’m not packed, but in the end, will anyone remember what I wore?

My husband says that after my first bout with cancer, I quit doing things I didn’t want to do. That’s not entirely true; every life is full of mundane and humdrum chores like packing. What has changed is that I try to not let obligation stand in the way of opportunity. Serious illness is a great corrective to the human impulse to tiptoe around our true calling. It reminds us that time is precious and fleeting.

June 9, 2017

The one thing you shouldn’t say to another artist

I hate the word “mindfulness,” but I’ve resolved to be mindful about offering unsolicited advice to my peers.

The Three Graces, available through Camden Falls Gallery. My to-do list includes painting more boats in the water.

I’m just smart enough to know when to ask other people for advice. It’s usually very helpful, and I have many friends I also consider to be mentors. Then there’s unsolicited advice. I’ve come to dread the phrase “you should…” It always means another project I don’t have time to finish.

That’s pretty ironic coming from someone who teaches. Much of my time is spent saying “you should…” to my students. I can justify that by saying that my students sought my help. But I’m starting to think that “you should…” is the least helpful and most corrosive way of framing ideas.

Dawson City, Yukon. My undone list also includes finding a venue for the paintings from my Trans-Canada trip.

“You should…” isn’t an offer of help. It often ignores the realities or ideas that prevent someone from doing what the speaker thinks needs doing.

“I already know I’m failing on a daily basis, because of the things I don’t get done,” an artist friend said recently. “I don’t need any help seeing that.”

Most professional artists are one-man shows. We do our own marketing, publicity, office work, and cleaning. Non-artists would be shocked at the number of hours we work, especially when our work seems to progress slowly.

I should put my remaining urban paintings on sale on the internet, since they’re unlikely to sell in a gallery here on the Maine coast.

I use Bobbi Heath’sorganizational system, here, to manage my work flow. Bobbi was a successful project manager in the corporate world. Her system is similar in concept to that which my husband’s software development team uses, although they don’t have cute Post-it notes. My calendar is computerized, as is my bookkeeping.

In other words, I’m as organized as I ever will be, and I still can’t get everything done. In fact, I have a standing to-do list that’s far longer than the working hours in my week. When I add another task to it, something else has to come out.

A great frame in its place, but its place isn’t here.

One of the big “you should…” tasks on my list is changing my frame style. What worked in New York is too heavy and formal for Maine.

I have a plan for a stunning, light floater frame, drawn for me by artist Ed Buonvecchio. A friend showed me another frame, with a wood liner, that is equally airy. I have the woodshop in which to build either style. What I don’t have is the time to do the work. So I ordered a different gold frame for the 2017 season, and my real update will have to wait another year.

There’s a lesson in this for me. I hate the word “mindfulness,” but I’ve resolved to be mindful about saying “you should…” to my peers. Is there a better way to express the idea? Should the idea be left unspoken? Does this person want my input, or would simply listening be more helpful?

April 11, 2017

Rags and bags

She’s a long, lean dash of black in the water, but up in the cradle, the schooner J. & E. Riggin had me foxed.

The J. & E. Riggin raising her sails, by Carol L. Douglas.

For someone who likes to paint to the accompaniment of birdsong, the North End Shipyard in April can be disconcerting. A general mayhem of front-loaders, trucks, hammers, power tools and a nearby radio combine into an industrial musique concrete. I enjoy it, but it’s not to everyone’s taste.

Ed Buonvecchiojoined me at the shipyard yesterday and was an instant fan. “Look at that band saw!” he exclaimed when I took him to the office to meet Shary. “We should paint that.” Well, we should, but not right now. If we get in the way during spring fit-out, they’ll probably feed us through the band saw.

The J. &. E. Riggen in the cradle, by Carol L. Douglas

The J. & E. Riggin is in the cradle right now, and she has foxed me. Her bow is spoon-shaped, and she is very long and low to the water. However, there’s an S-curve to her hull that I didn’t understand. It turns out that she has geriatric back troubles, just like me. “Hogging” is when a wooden boat gets a semi-permanent crimp in its keel.

She doesn’t seem to let it bother her too much. She was launched 90 years ago as an oyster dredger in Delaware Bay, and she’s still mighty spry for her age. She’s one of the few schooners I’ve painted under sail, when she was cavorting around Castine last summer. I don’t know what hogging means in terms of sailing function, but it makes her silhouette a long, lean dash of black. In that way, she’s decidedly not like me.

The winch house and bow of the J. &. E Riggin, by Ed Buonvecchio.

That hogging means her bow sits lower in the cradle than the smaller American Eagle’s, which you can easily see by comparing Ed’s terrific painting of the Riggin with mine of the Eagle.

Yesterday, I was having troubles. I chose a close crop of the stern and then promptly forgot it as I got sucked into the rhythm of the cradle supports. I forgot painting rags and a trash bag. I dropped my coffee into my backpack, and then I dropped my mineral spirits into the gravel. Then I dropped my painting jelly-side-down into the dirt. Mondays. Hah.

Captain Jon Finger stopped to talk to us. He’s a watercolorist. Of course, owning a schooner tends to use up all his spare time. “I do one painting a year and then I paint my boat,” he laughed. There’s such artistry involved in maintaining an elderly boat that it didn’t really surprise me to run into a captain who is also a painter.

The Riggin painted by her captain, Jon Finger.

Ed asked Captain Finger how they set the waterline when they replace large sections of planking. It turns out to be more or less a sophisticated process of estimation. Buoyancy varies based on temperature and salinity. On top of that, they are trying to draw a straight line on a curved and sinuous surface.

But waterlines are among the oldest ideas in human civilization. Systems and laws for regulating overloading of boats go back as far as Crete in 2500 BC. That’s a humbling idea on an airy, light Spring morning, when everything seems so new.

July 20, 2016

Far more fun than the convention

Come for the art show, stay for the full moon and balmy sea breezes.

Today is wrap-up day at Ocean Park’s Art in the Park. The wet paint show and saleis tonight from 5 to 7 PM. If you’re in Portland or points south, it’s a short drive to 14 Temple Ave, Ocean Park.

It’s a Perfect 10 day. You’ll see fine artwork in a beautiful historic beach town and you can stroll downtown for an ice cream cone afterward. Above all, nobody will be talking about the Republican National Convention.

Tour-de-force painting of the shuffleboard sign by Russel Whitten. I'm sure he finished this as perfectly as he started it.

Tour-de-force painting of the shuffleboard sign by Russel Whitten, in progress.

For the artists, the last day of an event means finishing work, taking photos, framing and packing. If there’s time, we might even paint one more piece just for fun. For watercolorists and pastel artists, the added work is even more considerable, since they must frame under glass and mount their work on acid-free paper.

Our workbenches are any flat surfaces we can appropriate for a few minutes. I have the luxury of a picnic table and fine weather today, but there have been many times I’ve framed on the back deck of my little Prius.

I started my morning yesterday by finishing my ice cream parlor painting from Monday. Anthony Watkins and Ed Buonvecchio chose the same subject, so we held an impromptu salon under the maples at the corner of Temple and Grand. All three of us like talking about painting almost as much as we like doing it.

“Goosefare sunset,” 10X8, Carol L. Douglas

An aspiring painter named Heidy sat down to watch me paint. When I realized she had her kit in her car, I suggested she paint with us in the afternoon. “You’ve chosen well, or badly,” I told her. “You’re surrounded by painting teachers.” It wasRussel Whitten who broke first and gave her an impromptu watercolor lesson.

Larry, Curly and Moe lost on a sand dune. (That’s really Anthony Watkins, Russ Whitten and Ed Buonvecchio.)

In addition to painting, Ed and I hawk Plein Air Painters of Maine to other painters. This totally-free association is a great resource. For most people, it’s important to have support and company in what is essentially a solitary pursuit.

“Curve on Goosefare Brook,” 8X6, Carol L. Douglas.

It’s not that common for event painters to move in a pack like we’ve been doing. I’ve really enjoyed it. For all our larking about, the work we’re turning out is of consistent high caliber. We’re all relaxed and having fun, and it shows in our work.

July 19, 2016

What could possibly go wrong?

"Ocean Park Ice Cream Parlor," 12X16. I'm heading down to finish it this morning.

“Ocean Park Ice Cream Fountain,” 12X16. I’m heading down to finish it this morning.

Early yesterday I got a call from Ed Buonvecchio, who is painting at Ocean Park’sArt in the Park with me. He planned to paint along the railroad tracks on the road into town. I told him it sounded, frankly, awful. I’d find my own darn painting spot.

Ambling along Temple Avenue, I ran into Frank Gwalthney, who was walking purposefully up the street. “Could you let me into Jakeman Hall to sharpen my pencils?” I asked.

“I need to run down to the tracks first,” he responded. “I got a call that Ed’s car is too close to the tracks. He needs to move it before it gets hit by a train.”

“Rising Surf,” 8X6, painted from the water side.

Happily, I can report that neither Ed nor his car was harmed, although he was close enough to the tracks that he seemed a little, well, stunned the rest of the day. I was so wrong about the subject. Ed’s painting is one of those rare things that make me think, “I wish I’d painted that.”

Art in the Park has been redesigned to be an invitational event with just five painters. This means we get to know our fellows much better than at the typical event, where 30 painters swarm across the landscape. I took my lunch break under a spreading maple with Christine Mathieu. Our paths have crossed over the years, but this was the first time we’ve ever really had a chance to talk.

The storm which rolled across Maine yesterday rumbled and threatened but eventually skipped over us. It arrived conveniently a few moments before our opening reception at Porter Hall. I enjoyed chatting with a woman who regularly reads my blog at home in St. Martins in the Caribbean.

Painting in the surf. I kept moving the easel toward shore whenever I felt it start slipping.

In the evening I took a few minutes to jump into the sea. “Why not?” I asked myself as I pondered how gorgeous the surf always looks from the water side. The tide was rising, so I had to move my easel every few minutes, but painting from the water worked just fine—until I tried to get the salt-water out of my tripod. It’s carbon fiber, so it isn’t going to rust, but I’m worried about the fittings.

Russ Whitten, Ed Buonvecchio and I painting nocturnes at the end of the day.

Russ Whitten, Ed Buonvecchio and I painted nocturnes at the end of the day.

We ended the day at the Temple, where Ed, Russel Whitten and I set up perilously late to paint a nocturne. (It helps if you do the drawing when it’s still light.) This was a little hard on Russ, whose watercolor paper wasn’t drying in the night air, and who has to “dance backwards,” leaving openings for the light areas instead of painting them in at the end.

The Temple, unfinished. I’ll finish it tonight.

The three of us grumbled and laughed about the absurdity of what we were doing but in the end we all turned out respectable attempts. Fourteen hours after we’d started working we folded up for the night. Today we do it again. It’s a fascinating life, although sometimes it’s grueling as well.