The Geoduck Tavern is a venerable bar/restaurant on the shores of Hood Canal, just below Brinnon, WA. You can have clam chowder or oyster shooters while seated on the back deck overlooking the tide flats of the Dosewallips River. I took a photo of the deck and later made this painting, first in one color, then in watercolor.
Dining on the deck at the Geoduck Tavern Read More »
I’ve been busy traveling and haven’t had a chance to paint lately. But summer is almost here and it’s time to paint outdoors in the fresh air. This is known as plein air painting, a well-loved practice of painters who like to paint on location. There’s a freshness and spontaneity that come from painting outdoors. These two paintings were made on location. My goal is to do a lot of plein air painting this summer.
The first painting is of The Tides, a cozy restaurant located about 5 miles North of Hoodsport, WA, right next to Highway 101. I got a great cup of clam chowder there. I like the shadows from the building and the lovely tall Douglas-fir tree next to it.
The second painting is a ramshackle house in Bremerton, WA, on a steep street. I particularly like it because of the odd angles and bold colors.
Plein air paintings Read More »
In my imagination this barn was built many years ago by a frugal hardworking farmer as he and his family carved out a homestead on Big Valley Road. He built the main barn first, then added to it over the years, patching shed to shed, until it became this sprawling structure backed up to the fir trees.
In our last watercolor class, Eric Wiegardt challenged me to paint on a bigger scale. So I painted the barn as a quarter sheet (11 x 15 inches), followed by a half sheet (15 x 20 inches). You have to use a big brush and lots of paint and water to cover so much paper. For the barn and the meadow I painted three different colored washes on top of each other to produce variation in the color. I was undecided about the large expanse of grass in front of the barn. It seems like it needs something. Texture, maybe? Shadows? A piece of farm equipment or a pickup truck? Or maybe it’s fine as it is.
Barn on Big Valley Road Read More »
Last summer when I visited friends on Kupreanof Island in Southeast Alaska, I took a photo of nearby Sasby Island. It lies just across the Wrangell Narrows from the town of Petersburg, and has exactly one house on it, complete with a dock and boatshed. The dock is tucked in behind a small point so that it’s completely protected.
I made a series of watercolors to see how best to capture this scene.
Sasby Island in Southeast Alaska Read More »
At high tide, the creeks that run up into Willapa Bay come right up into the trees. In our watercolor class last week, Eric Wiegardt made a demonstration painting of one of these creeks, and today I made a copy of his painting. First I did a black and white version, then I did a color version.
The goal is to create a painting that draws the eye to the area of dominance, in this case the point where the trees and the water meet. I put in the most detail in the edges of the trees, and I painted a red slash of brush below the trees to draw the eye there. I de-emphasized the lower portion, especially the lower corners, to not distract from the area of dominance above. Eric’s watercolor was much more lively because he painted without stopping, letting the washes flow into one another, and he kept his brush strokes loose. I was only partially successful in copying him.
Willapa Bay estuary Read More »
Walking on the beach with someone you love is a favorite pastime in the Pacific Northwest. The pungent smells of salt air, sea water and marine life make for good memories. I painted this watercolor series from a photo of a beach at Fort Flagler, not too far from here. It was in an article explaining how the silt and dirt from bluffs in Puget Sound fall into the water and feed the shoreline with material for new beaches that become habitat for marine life.
I made a watercolor from the photo, then remembered that my class assignment is to do a black-and-white version. So I painted the black and white watercolor, which is probably better than the color version. The next day I painted a second version of the scene in color. You can decide which one you like better.
Fort Flagler bluff Read More »
I was captivated by a watercolor painting by artist Jerry Stitt showing a cabin by the edge of a bay. I painted a copy, and then I made a second version with changes to make it my own. I reversed the image left to right and changed the background.
I was happy with the foggy mountaintop in the color version. You get this affect by painting the background clouds, then waiting until just the right moment to add the trees on the ridgetop. If you time it right, the edge of the ridge melts into the clouds, giving the appearance of a rainy mountain day. If you add the ridge too soon, it just dissolves in the clouds. If you wait too long (as I did in the black and white painting), it becomes a hard edge.
Big Valley, just north of Poulsbo, was once a bustling community of small farms and pastures strung along the valley with fir trees on the ridges above. Because of its iconic beauty, the County has spared it the plague of modern development so it retains the character of early Kitsap County. It’s a great place for watercolor painting.
I particularly like this trailer along the road. It’s a little run-down, but it’s homey, and in my imagination the family who lives there has a real sense of ownership of their piece of the valley.
I made a black and white painting to get the values right, then I made several watercolors.
Trailer on Big Valley road Read More »
On a rainy day last week, I took a drive down Tracyton Boulevard. It’s a winding road along the shores of Dye’s Inlet, and it has some great views. I took a photo of a car on a curve of the road, and made a painting of it when I got back in my studio.
The assignment for my watercolor class is to paint a one-color version of a scene, then paint a three-color version of the same scene. So I made a one-color painting with Payne’s Gray, then I made a three-color painting using Ultramarine Blue, Burnt Umber, and Quinacridone Gold. My goal was to paint the background trees wet-in-wet to capture the feeling of a foggy, rainy day.
Rainy day on Tracyton Boulevard Read More »
For my watercolor class assignment last week, I painted a series of watercolors with stormy skies, inspired by our winter weather. I began by painting some wind-tossed trees, and I liked the watercolor a lot. Unfortunately, it suffered from the beginner’s mistake of painting objects in an even row, with no variation in spacing. So for my next attempts, I separated the trees on two sides of the painting and added a barn and some cows to give a sense of scale. I first made a black-and-white watercolor, on the suggestion of our teacher, then I made several color versions.
