Most people don’t think of a clearcut as a subject for a painting, but when I crested the ridge over Port Hadlock recently, I looked back to see a sprawling view of Puget Sound, framed with an island of trees left by the loggers. What could be more Pacific Northwest than a clearcut view? I took some photos and came back to my studio to paint the scene. My first attempt had too many hard edges, so I painted it again with some soft edges. Here’s my second painting, with the first attempt below it. You can see how I let the bottom edge of the clump of trees on the left blend into the yellow below, and I let the edge of the far gray mountains blur into the sky. I also added some purple to complement the field of yellow in the clearcut.
As I look back on my paintings over the course of 2023, I see some progress. Compared to this time last year, I feel my paintings are more confident and more accomplished, and other people have remarked on the progress. The big watershed for me was a four-day workshop I took with my teacher, Eric Wiegardt, near his home in Long Beach, Washington. Eric uses lots of paint and lots of water, and he paints with confidence. When I do that, my paintings are more lively and more powerful.
Here’s a painting I did in January that’s fussy and disconnected. Things just don’t flow.
Here’s a painting I did near the end of the year, where you can see the brush strokes blending together in a harmonious way.
I made a determined effort last year to learn to paint trees, using a splayed out mop brush like Eric taught us. I think my trees are much better now.
I also worked hard to connect my shapes and washes so that the painting doesn’t look like a bunch of disconnected shapes. I think I improved here, too.
I traveled to different areas in Western Washington on six occasions to paint outdoors, often with other painters, and I learned a lot from these trips. Not that the paintings were always successful, but the experience of painting outside helped me when I got back to the studio.
I’ve tried to choose a wide variety of subjects — beaches, tide flats, buildings, boats, farms and forests — although I can see I have a preference for subjects around the water. It just feels more dramatic to me.
Often it feels that I am fighting a painting. My brush strokes are dry and scratchy, my shapes are disconnected and awkward, and the painting just doesn’t come together. Other times the paint flows, the shapes magically seem to blend into each other, and the painting takes on a life of its own. Let’s hope for more of the latter in the coming year!
Every Sunday Katy and I drive over the Skokomish River where it empties into tidewater at Hood Canal. It’s a rich area for wildlife and fish because of the mix of fresh and salt water, and it’s visually interesting because of the variety of waterways: mud flats, old pilings, the winding river, swampy low areas, hay fields and old barns.
A couple of Sundays ago, as we drove past, the tide was high and the water was up into the bushes beside the river. I took some photos of the tide flats out of the window of the car (Katy was driving). Later, I used one of those photos to make this watercolor. I painted wet-into-wet for the background to produce the soft layer of foggy trees, than I added the foreground with dry strokes.
In the last week I’ve painted a number of 7×11 watercolors from photos I’ve taken in this area. Here are a few.
The Skokomish River empties into Hood Canal and forms a tide flat that’s flooded at high tide. Katy and i drive by this section of the river every Sunday on the way to church.A bigleaf maple tree on the Skokomish Indian Reservation. I like the varied colors of the tree trunk but I didn’t get the yellow leaves as crisp as I would like.The rear of an abandoned house on Potlatch Road. I like the crumbling dignity of old houses.Barnes Creek near Lake Crescent lodge, painted from a footbridge that Katy and I have hiked several times. I like this composition and I think I’ll try it again.A storage shed in the woods for a construction company. Simple but effective.
The little-known Tahuya River winds its way out of the second-growth forest near the end of the Kitsap Peninsula and empties into the tidewater of Hood Canal. One morning last week I hiked up the river on an abandoned logging road and explored the grass flats that cover the bottom land. The autumn air was shivery cool and moist; golden leaves covered the grassy track, and deep green shadows emerged from the forest slopes.
The upper reaches of the river were still in fog, while the lower meadows had strong shadows reaching across them. I took a photo and returned to the car. When I got home I painted a watercolor trying to preserve the memory of that walk. Pretty happy with the result. I’m donating this painting to the Bremerton Rotary Club for their annual fundraising auction. It already has a buyer.
At first sight, Shine Tidelands State Park is not very impressive. Just off the West end of the Hood Canal Bridge, a rutted gravel road takes you to a neglected rest area next to a windswept beach where one or two figures hunched against the wind are walking their dogs.
But it made a good subject for a painting last Friday. Wrapped up against the cold and blustery day, I made a small plein air painting of the marsh that lies between the beach and the bluff. I’d never noticed this marsh before, but once I really looked at the scene, it popped out at me. I painted it pink to emphasize it.
Later, back in the studio, I expanded this small painting into a full-size 16 x 20 inch watercolor. I’m going to submit this pair of paintings into the Winter Show of Plein Air Washington Artists. Here is the full-size painting with the smaller plein air painting below it.
The marsh at Shine Tidelands State Park, 16 x 20 inchesPlein air painting of the marsh at Shine Tidelands State Park, 7 x 11 inches
In September, I painted several plein air paintings at La Push, a small fishing village on the outer coast of Washington. Now I’d like to enter an art show that asks for a plein air painting plus a studio painting developed from the plein air painting. The idea is to contrast the immediacy of the in-the-field effort against the more leisurely and controlled environment of the studio.
One of my plein air paintings was a painting of a boat at the fish dock in La Push, so I used it as my starting point. I painted 8 more paintings of the same subject. Each time I painted it I was unsatisfied, but I learned something on each attempt. Below you can see the finished product, and below that you can see some of my earlier versions.
I love the harbor at La Push. It’s a dramatic scene, with James Island just out to sea from the harbor, and you can see the swells from the open ocean crashing against the outside of the island. As soon as the boats leave the harbor, they encounter the open ocean. It’s not a place for a faint-hearted fisherman.
My final versionMy first version, made standing in the harbor parking lot.Experimenting with different colors.Six of my many attempts to make this painting. All are 11 x 15 inches.
I got a call from the Very Rev. Steve Thomason, the Dean of St. Mark’s Cathedral in Seattle, asking if I would paint two or three watercolors of the cathedral for use as gifts for their donors at a fundraising gala next spring. I know Steve from my work in the Diocese, and I was happy to agree.
I went to St. Mark’s, took some photos and made some sketches. The cathedral is essentially a huge cube with big buttresses perched on the top of Capitol Hill overlooking the city of Seattle and Union Bay far below. When I got home, I started working in the studio to develop them into paintings that can be used for reproductions. Here’s what I came up with.
St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral, Seattle, 11 x 15 inches
Let me show you the series I made to get to this point. I started by making a small watercolor with ink outlines. This type of watercolor is easy to reproduce and looks pleasant to the eye, but it’s a little tight and cramped for my style.
St. Mark’s Cathedral, 7 1/2 x 11 inches
My vision for this watercolor is to capture the grandeur of the large imposing mass of the cathedral. This is the House of God. So in my next painting I put dark clouds in the background.
St. Mark’s Cathedral, 7 1/2 x 11 inches
I like this, but it’s probably too stark and gloomy for a donor gift. So I tried again in a larger format.
St. Mark’s Cathedral, 11 x 15 inches
This is pretty good, but the windows need more color in them, and the clouds look muddy. So I tried again, and I was satisfied with my final effort. Here it is again.
St. Mark’s Cathedral, 11 x 15 inches
I like the tapered mass of the cathedral and the way the clouds loom about the top of the building. The colors are varied, and the figures at the bottom add some life to the painting.
I find that working through a series of paintings like this is helpful. I learn a little each time I make a painting of the subject, and each one gets a little better. It’s a long and painstaking process, but it’s one way to make some improvement.
For my birthday, Katy and I went out to dinner with our good friends Kathleen and John Kingslight. We met at Anthony’s, a swanky restaurant near the ferry terminal in Bremerton, and enjoyed good food and great company. Kathleen is the rector of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Bremerton, so the couples have a lot in common and we always share lots of laughs.
John and Kathleen kindly gave me a small watercolor sketchbook for my birthday. A couple of days later, I used the sketchbook to make a watercolor painting of St. Paul’s. I emailed a photo of the painting to them to show my appreciation for the sketchbook and for them to use as a graphic for St. Paul’s. It might be used in their bulletin or newsletter or on their website. Everyone likes to see an original sketch of their church.
The watercolor in the sketchbookThe 8×8 inch sketchbookSt. Paul’s on a cloudy dayInk sketch of St. Paul’s
Recently I was asked by my friend, the Rev. Eric Stelle, to paint a watercolor of his church to be used as an item in their silent auction fundraiser. Of course I was eager to please my friend, so I said yes and drove to St. John’s Episcopal Church in Gig Harbor to make a pencil sketch and a plein air painting.
The painting wasn’t good enough to be used for the auction, so I came back to my studio and made another. Again, it wasn’t quite right, so I made another. And another. And another. I made a total of 18 small watercolors, trying to improve each one. Finally I came up against the deadline and sent him three watercolors and an ink sketch.
As I painted the same subject over and over I became very familiar with the scene and I began to vary my interpretation. I think I learned a lot about composition and color choices. But I’m not sure if I want to paint every subject 18 times! I told Eric that he can use the images for their publications (newsletter, letterheads, etc) and for their website. I hope the silent auction will be successful.
Ink sketch of St. John’s, for use in publications and website.Watercolor of St. John’s Episcopal Church, Gig Harbor, WAWatercolor with ink lines.A simplified, more abstract version.
