June 2023

Camping and painting on Lopez Island

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Last week I spent two days on Lopez Island with other members of Plein Air Washington Artists (PAWA). On Tuesday evening, we gathered for dinner at the Lopez Islander Resort, then we painted on various locations on the island Wednesday and Thursday.

Lopez Island is one of the San Juan Islands in the extreme northwest of the state, and it’s only reachable by ferry from Anacortes. Its gently rolling topography is filled with farms, pastures, and forests. It’s a bucolic place; people raise a hand in greeting from the steering wheel when they pass on the roads.

I camped at Spencer Spit State Park, as did several other PAWA painters. On Wednesday morning several of us met to paint on the beach at the park. I made this painting of a bluff along the shore.

Spencer Spit State Park

In the afternoon we moved to the south end of the island where there is an abandoned dock and oil tanks on a little point. I think it’s the most picturesque place I’ve seen. I found a vantage point on the rocks and painted the old dock, then I moved back and painted the house and the oil tanks above the cove. It was fun comparing work with the other painters.

Richardson Road dock
Richardson Road house and cove

While we were there, one of the other painters took a photo of me painting.

On Thursday morning we met at Agate Beach County Park and walked to Iceberg Point, a barren outcrop of land facing the open sea to the south. I made a painting of this tree tucked into the rocks before lunch. Afterwards I walked to the point and back, but I was frankly too tired to focus on any more painting. I caught the ferry later in the evening and drove home.

Tree at Iceberg Point
My camp at Lopez Island.

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Painting the seashore

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For my assignment for my watercolor class this week, I decided to paint a scene from a photo of Lopez Island, one of the San Juan Islands in Puget Sound. I’m going there next week to paint with other plein air painters, and I thought I’d practice before I go. I chose a scene of a rocky inlet with trees on the hillside. Little did I know how I would struggle with those rocks! I painted five versions of this watercolor in addition to the black and white version. In the end, I used a credit card to scrape out the shapes of the rocks in the foreground.

Watercolor number five
Black and white version

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Painting Lake Crescent with friends

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Kayaks at the dock of Log Cabin Resort

On Thursday and Friday I attended a paintout event with Plein Air Washington Artists at Lake Crescent in Olympic National Park, one of my favorite locations. We started at Log Cabin Resort on East Beach Road. I made a painting of kayaks at the dock, above. I was pleased with the way the yellow from the kayaks melted in to the blue of the water below.

The same kayaks zoomed out.

The second day it rained. I tried to paint from the shore, but my watercolor was ruined by drops of rain. So I moved to the shelter of the porch at Lake Crescent Lodge and painted the long row of tourist cabins and the big Doug-fir trees that tower over them.

The cabins at Lake Crescent Lodge.

There were probably twenty or more artists at their easels around the lake, and it was a lot of fun to see what other people were painting. On our second day, we shared our paintings before we left and gave each other lots of encouragement and support. I camped Wednesday and Thursday nights at Fairholme Campground at the end of the lake.

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An angry old man and a kind woman rancher

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Last week I drove to the Chimacum area to find a place to paint. I found beautiful barns and farmhouses set in a valley surrounded by forests.

It was early morning with strong shadows. I set up my easel on the shoulder of the road and made a pencil sketch of a house across a field on the far side of the road. When I saw a man come out of the house and drive his tractor across the field toward me, I thought he was coming to exchange pleasantries with me. Most people are happy to see artists. Not this fellow.

“What the hell are you doing?? he yelled as he came near. I said, “I’m going to make a painting of your house.” He said, “The hell you are. You get out of here. We have enough robo-calls as it is. Get the hell out of here!”

I said, “You don’t want me to make a painting of your house?” He said with venom, “No! Get the hell out of here.” So I did. I packed up my easel and drove away.

I knew that he had no right to make me leave my place by the roadside. State law allows anyone to take photos or make paintings from a public road. But I wasn’t about to try to get in an argument with a man who was apoplectic with rage. Later it occurred to me that he might have had a gun.

I drove down the road and found a sprawling barn on a hill that just begged to be painted. So I got out of the car and set up my easel again. A pickup from the farm came out to see what I was doing, but this time it was a woman rancher in a denim shirt and jeans, maybe in her fifties. She asked about my painting and said she’d love to see what I came up with. “I have to go to town but you’re welcome to paint anywhere you want,” she said. What a contrast.

So I made this quick watercolor sketch of the barn and one of her cows. She said the cow was just about ready to give birth to a calf.

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