Painting Spring!

Spring has arrived a bit slow here in Minnesota this year, but it's here and there's way too much to paint!  The Crab Apple trees have already come and gone, the lilacs are going crazy and the green is electric!  This new green of spring for the most part is a bit tough to paint and can be somewhat unpleasing to end up with, however it is what it is and the fact that it's green and not white is a very good thing!  Last week I spent the week painting outside on location at the farm where I grew up.  The little stream piece was done in about an hour and a half in the evening.  I stood on the bridge crossing over the water looking North.  I had my daughter and my dog along with so there were a few distractions but it's life and the fact I was painting 'from life' it seemed pretty fitting!  The added bonus to bringing along a 12 year old and a 6 month old black lab puppy is there is no time to spare!  It forces one to put it down and put it down right!  

Lilacs, gotta love 'em!  And 'gotta paint 'em FAST'!  They don't stay perky for long once cut.  I did this piece in one full day and decided to be finished.  My goal was to use natural light so it would be a bit softer and cooler than the controlled warm lighting I often use in my still lifes.  I like that the shadows are so warm and soft.  There are lots of little temperature notes in the whites that I'm afraid is difficult to view their subtleties due to my horrible photography skills.  The tiny little notes of differences are quite beautiful in their purity.  These delicate degrees of differences are what drive and inspire me to paint flowers from life. It's absolutely incredible the colors that exist!   

"Fresh Cut Lilacs"

14x14 oil on linen panel

"Stream In Spring"

10x8 oil on linen panel

Paint The Hills Of Tuscany With Kami Polzin

Who Wants To Go To Italy?!!!!  Raise your hand!!!

I will be returning to Tuscany Italy in May of 2012 to teach a workshop and mentoring program in
May of 2012. 
For details and registration info visit the link below.  I can't wait to paint the hills of Tuscany again! 

http://www.ilchiostro.com/index.php?action=workshop-details&item=200

Blue Hydrangeas

"Blue Hydrangeas"

16x20 oil on linen

This is my latest studio piece just finished a few days ago.  It was so refreshing to paint live hydrangeas  this time of year around here!  I grow hydrangeas in my garden at home but they're not ready until mid summer to paint so this was a real treat to be able to paint one of my favorite flowers in the first week of May.  I found a potted plant of Endless Summer Hydrangeas in the garden center at Home Depot a few weeks ago that were in FULL beautiful bloom and thought they'd be perfect for painting and better yet after painting I can put the plant in the ground and paint them again and again!  

I painting a lot of flowers from life, and I have to say for ME hydrangeas and peonies (lilacs too) are some of the most difficult flower to paint.  I think it's because each flower has thousands of little petals in each head which makes it easy to get overwhelmed by the 'millions' of sweet little petals in this flower.  I find it crucial when painting these to keep the lights and darks separate and only paint the darks compared to the light, not what the darks look like when you look INTO the darks.  The darks have to be painted in relation to the lights to pull off the correct value and temperature relationship to achieve the saturation of the lights.  

In composing this painting, I was thinking about all the texture in the flowers and the play of the soft elegance of the round glass vase.  I like how it almost disappears into the background.  And then the few little crisp notes in the 3 little fallen petals on the table top!  

Harmony Side by Side!

"In The Meadow"

24x24 oil on linen

"A Walk In The Queen Anne's Lace"

24x24 oil on linen

It all started with a few little panels, some paint, and an idea which led me to paint these 2 @ 24x24s, that as I see it belong together, side by side!

 Sometimes I seriously wonder, 'where do paintings come from?'  It really is a mystery, a beautiful one, but a mystery just the same.  I think that's what I especially love about the landscape, it's the little bit of unknown and all the beautiful layers of depth and subtlety that are provided for us.  I recently read a quote that said something like this . . .  "don't be humble, you're not that great".  Kind of makes me laugh at the truth of that statement but I can't think of a better word for the way I feel standing in Nature than 'humbled' each and EVERY SINGLE time! It's kind of like being a "Mom":) 

  The two paintings above are my take on all the feelings that I have in response to Nature at this point.  

They are my quiet take on the peacefulness I feel and respect I have of the Natural world.  

Early Spring Bunch

"Early Spring Bunch"

14x11 oil on linen panel

It's been a busy couple of weeks in and around the studio!  Since my last post, I've taught several classes and have been painting as much as possible in between.  Last weekend I was down in Zumbrota Minnesota at Crossings Art Center teaching a 2 day color temperature workshop using the still life as our resource to study from.  It was seriously a dedicated group of painters.  I've said it before, and I'm sure will say it again, but it's SO inspiring and rewarding to work with such great people and also to watch their growth and discoveries with their painting!  We painted from fresh flower arrangements like this one I painted here.  Only this piece I did at my studio a couple of days before the workshop to get my head where it needed to be.  (I also did a full demo at the workshop that I will post later.)  

Hope you enjoy the piece!  

24x24 "Harmony Of The Meadow" (demo)

This is my latest studio memory piece.  My plan is do 2 more pieces in this 24x24 format of the same meadow area with different moods and light.  I am using my little 6"x6"pieces I did for the 6" Squared Exhibition in California.  I've got those 3 pieces posted below and they are currently somewhere between here and there on their way to the show, I'd like to be going with my little paintings!  

But, oh well. . . . :)

When starting this piece, I had every good intention of photographing the process in it's important developing stages, but once really getting in to the painting I was so zoned that I forgot to keep up the shooting of this piece.  So here's what I had! 

When I'm beginning a painting, either small or larger, I'm always thinking of the placement of the large abstract shapes that will construct the composition.  Believe me, I LOVE this tree and all it's character but I'm seeing and thinking of it's shape and the fact that it is a form.  Same goes with the background mass of trees and the meadow area.  I paint landscape because of my love for it but I don't get caught up in the little details of it's complexity.  I believe in painting with great reservation to show these beautiful little exceptions at the end of the piece.  (such as the flowers in this piece) The tiny notes of purity in the end of a painting are what people and comment on see but it's the underlying structure of these shapes that gives a painting it's 'bones'.  

So, that's what I was thinking at this stage.  Starting with my shapes of darks and working the lines of the composition.  I usually start with a wash of some sort.  I probably used a transparent oxide red in this one. . . ? 

At this stage I'm pretty happy with the feel and composition so I start to work the form by developing what is going on within the big shapes.  

I begin to 'work up' or 'build up' the paint a bit.  I always start my painting pretty thin and 'work up' the paint, meaning start to work a bit thicker as the painting develops.  If I work too thick in the beginning stages of a painting, I can completely lose it!  I think paint quality has a lot to do with paint consistency.  I don't usually use any mediums, for the most part anyway, but I do use mineral spirits to thin my paint and get the consistency I like.  Paint consistency is very personal and it's difficult for anyone to tell a student painter exactly how their paint should feel to them but I do think you have to paint a LOT before you know what works best for you.  I'm always exploring this as I work, and really it's feeling of the paint under the brush that I crave the most about painting.     

As you can see here I start adding some color in the foreground grasses.  But it was not until the very end stages of the painting that I even thought about adding the bits of colors in the flowers.  

A note about painting grasses:  it's important to search for and find the shapes, even in a subject (like grasses in a meadow) that provides a less than obvious structure, and contains much more of a subtle separation of lights and darks.  Connect your lights and connect your darks to begin.  Realize that under all the lush color is the warmth of the earth that vibrates through on a very subtle level.  Build from there and even in the most busy field of wild flowers, nature gracefully connects these dancing notes of color.  It's up to us as artists to find the connection and sweep of these notes to serve the area as a one unified and cohesive statement, the whole.  

"Harmony Of The Meadow"

24x24 oil on linen panel

Painting Last Bits Of Winter

I Got out and painted what we in Minnesota HOPE is possibly the last bits winter.  I love the contrast of the ground with the snow this time of year and the beautiful patterns it leaves as the snow slowly melts.  My plan was to get out and paint the flood but it was pretty tough since the water was so high (floods do that you know. . . :)  It was a beautiful day and I was happy just being by the river.  The trumpeter swans and Canadian geese were plenty noisy, and hearing the ice shift as it forced it way to thaw was very powerful company, humbling to say the least.  Besides one lone hiker (who took these photos of me on his iphone) I was the only one out enjoying the day.  

What is the rest of the world thinking missing this stuff???  

 I fell in love with this tree and little patch of snow cradling around it's base so decided this would be the painting.  Initially I started out painting the light and shadows casting on the sandstone behind but ended up taking that out to support the design of the snow and the blue cast shadows raking across it.  Not to mention I was out so long my light drastically changed before I was finished!  All and all a good day!

this is a photo the friendly hiker took of my hand. . . . 

just getting my darks massed. . . .

"Last Bits Of Winter"

14x11 oil on linen panel

P.S. this photo looks a bit warmer than the original . . . .