Downpour, 6X8, oil on archival canvasboard, $348 includes shipping and handling in continental US
Stop me if you’ve heard this before, but it’s raining. I love these spring rains; it’s chilly but not cold, and the plants begin their rebirth. But as Ken DeWaard says, who needs another grey painting?
Actually, I disagree. Sea fog can be very beautiful, as I hope I’ve demonstrated below. And if you don’t believe me, ask the great Romantic painter Caspar David Friedrich.
Sea Fog, 9X12, oil on archival canvasboard, $696 unframed.
Painting rainbows is tough. They’re luminous, shimmering, and there’s really no shift in value. Double rainbows are even harder; they have a slightly darker passage between the color bands, which looks ridiculous in paint. Not that there’s anything wrong with being ridiculous.
Toy Reindeer with double rainbow, oil on archival canvasboard, 6X8, $435 framed, includes shipping in continental US.
That day started with a halfhearted rain and moved to a downpour, much as yesterday and the day before (and so many other days this spring) have done here in Maine. It’s impossible to paint outdoors in these conditions, even in oil. The mist beads up on your palette and emulsifies with your paint. So, on that day, I painted through a window. The angle wasn’t great, and I only caught a small smidgeon of sky, which is why it has that deep central vee. However, the things that matter are all there: the southern beeches, the pinnacle rock formations, and, of course, the rainbow.
Athabasca Glacier, 14X18, oil on linen, $1275 includes shipping and handling in the continental US.
I’ve spent a lot of time this year working on projects without roadmaps. Such is the case with today’s Virtual First Friday. Not only have I never done one of these, I’ve never attended one. (You can preview the paintings here.)
My daughter Mary (the soapmaker) is riding shotgun for this. That’s a funny coincidence, since she is the kid who crossed Alaska and Canada with me. We didn’t follow a map then, either. She and her younger brother love geology; when she was feeling well, she spouted Rock Facts on the dating app Tinder, to the frustration of many young Canadian men. They didn’t understand that to some of us, geology is sexy.
The Whole Enchilada, 12X16, oil on archival canvas. The red-roofed building is Hosteria el Pilar. I just realized none of my Patagonian paintings are on my website; I’ll get right on that.
Mary tells me that the American Cordillera is that chain of mountain ranges that forms the ‘backbone’ of the Americas (and also the volcanic arc that’s our half of the Pacific Ring of Fire). It runs from Alaska’s Brooks Range, through Central America, along the Andes, and all the way to the very tip of Antarctica.
I’ve painted at both ends, in Alaska and Canada, and in Patagonia. While preparing for North to Southwest: A Plein Air Perspective, we considered the relationship between those trips. In one way, they were both defined by illness. Mary spiked a fever as we reached the Arctic Circle. It was mononucleosis, and she didn’t start to recover until we were in Quebec.
Athabasca River Confluence, 9X12, $696 includes shipping and handling in continental US.
Our trip to Patagonia started the day of the world’s lockdown for COVID. Instead of hiking and painting in Argentina’s Parque Nacional Los Glaciares before heading out to Ushuaia, we were penned into smaller and smaller places, until we ended up in a hotel with an armed soldier at the door. Somehow, we all managed to get giardiasis. I don’t recommend it.
At six to ten million years old, the Andes are just babies; the mountains of Alaska and Northern Canada predate them by fifty million years, but both ranges are wild and fantastic.
Los Glaciares is located within the Southern Patagonian Ice Field, and I was able to paint the edges of several glaciers from the hostel grounds before we were sent to our rooms. On our trip across Canada, we brushed past the Kluane/Wrangell-St. Elias/Glacier Bay/Tatshenshini-Alsek Ice Field (that’s a mouthful) and stopped to visit the Columbia Ice Field, where I failed to paint the Athabasca Glacier. Conditions were just too miserable, so I did it later, in my studio.
Mary and I are already scheming about another Great Adventure. Hopefully we’ll encounter new geology, new friends and no new illnesses. It’s not too late to attend tonight’s virtual opening of North to Southwest: A Plein Air Perspective. And if you’re interested in a Great Adventure of your own where you’ll meet awesome people and do beautiful paintings, registration is currently open for my 2024 workshops. (Use the code EARLYBIRD to get $25 off any workshop except Sedona.)
