Painting large outdoors is very challenging, so most of my larger works are painted indoors in my studio. For reference, I'll use my photographs, memories and/or my smaller plein air paintings.
The two paintings below are an example of how I sometimes create a larger studio painting from a smaller plein air piece. The larger painting is usually pretty faithful to the original, but at some point it has to take a life of it's own and not be just a copy of the smaller one.
The 8x10" piece was painted on location in Mercer County Park North West on the first day of spring last year:
"Mercer Meadows" (small)
8x10" oil on board
8x10" oil on board
Sometime later, probably on a rainy day when I couldn't paint outside, I did this 18x24" painting in the studio, based on the smaller 8x10 plein air piece. This larger version has some more detail, and I added the tree on the right to improve the composition. I muted the ochers of the field to better balance the colors in the distant tree line and mountain:
"Mercer Meadows" (large)
18x24" oil on canvas
18x24" oil on canvas
These 2 paintings and more are on display in "Get Lost" - my 2 person show with Beatrice Bork, running November 11 to December 4, 2011 at:
Closing Reception: Sunday, Dec 4, 2-5pm
