CATHERINE CREEK, WA

Catherine Creek, east and uphill from Bingen, is a grassy plateau, dotted with wildflowers and criss-crossed by basalt outcroppings. When I arrive in the morning, the grasses have a green-gold glow, and shadows were strong and shapely. I can’t stand to stay in one place and paint. Slowly making the circuit, I photograph trees, rock, wildflowers, delighting in the variety of color and the light cool breeze.

By the time I am ready to settle down at my easel, the glow has gone off the morning. I choose a scene that includes a glimpse of the
Columbia, with a few of the strongest remaining shadows, and a quirky
pine.

Today is an experiment in eyewear. With my polarized glasses on, the
colors of the grass and flowers are intensified, and I have this idea
that I might look at the landscape through my glasses, and at my
canvas without them, in a sort of reverse reading glass. This totally
doesn’t work. I keep forgetting to sneak my canvas views under the
glass, and my colors end up garish and unnaturally green. Scrape it
off and try again.

The colors underneath strongly influence my later choices. People come by and look at my canvas, then leave, saying nothing. Always a bad sign. I finish the painting anyway,
hoping that a few of the color notes will be useful for a later
painting. And anyway, it has been such a beautiful day, with such good
company, that I am thankful to be thankful to be out and painting.
Without wind or rain!

PORTLAND, OR

Yesterday I met two other painters, Quin and Andrew, in Willamette Park, in John’s Landing. It’s a very urban park, well-used, with varied views of city, river, bridges, distant mountains, wetland, park benches, playground, and boats of all kinds. While the boats were attractive, and probably the most representative part of the park, they are difficult for me. For one thing, they don’t sit still, so it’s a lot like painting the people at the farm market. When I paint people, they get one person’s shirt, another person’s head, another person’s shopping bag. While I can get away with this with people, it will never do to put sails atop a motor boat, so I am stuck. I take a few photos of boats, then turn my attention to the island across the river.
Here is familiar material. And enchanting. The spring warming has budded out most trees, and they all have hints of color. Across the river I see fresh green, orange, pink and violet tones at the tops of the otherwise bare trees. I paint the sky and water first, since they are changing fast, then start on the trees. They give me some trouble. How much do I want to show branches? The trees look too vague with none at all, but too many trunks and branches make them look spotty, so far away. I fuss around with this for a while.
A goose is stalking me. Perhaps she wants to be fed. I pull out my camera and stalk her back. She skirts me, heading over to the park bench, where the grass is infused with lawn daisies. She attacks the daisies, pulling the heads, and eating them like fruit. Behind her, a path of daisy-less lawn, as if she had been employed to weed.
As I finish my painting, the clouds have moved in and colors flatten. At home, I see that my usual preoccupation with water and clouds has overtaken the subtle colors of the trees. Probably, I should repaint this to capture what I intended. Stay tuned.

DAWSON CREEK PARK

A typical fall day, starting with heavy fog, promising maybe rain, maybe clearing. Several other painters are here, some working in pastel, oil, acrylic. As usual, I am amazed at the variety of approaches to the subject. Some begin with texture and variety of color. Some focus in on the cattails, or the fall bushes. I quickly block in my main value shapes, then go to work adding in variety of color.

I have set up under a large fir tree. When the promised drizzle comes, I am completely undisturbed, continuing to pick out colors within colors, adding to the sky as the clouds shift.

One by one, my companions grow cold and leave. I am wearing a winter wool hat, thick socks, and my muk-luks. Perhaps warm feet are the secret to staying warm. Or maybe standing, instead of sitting so that I move around a lot. The ducks seem plenty warm. I wonder how they keep their feet from freezing, just skin muscle and bone, hanging out there in the cold water all day. Or maybe they just don’t care, the way I don’t notice aches in my knees until I am almost finished with my painting.

GETTING RESTARTED

A student asked what advice she could pass on to a friend who has taken a break from painting and wants to get back to it. Here's what I told her:

1. Make a place to paint. Find someplace where you can leave yourstuff out, so all you have to do is clean your brushes and cover yourpaints when you quit.

2. Set aside 5 minutes every day and paint for five minutes. If youdo more, great. If you paint 5 minutes a day, your brain decides thatit is an important activity and rewires for it while you sleep. Don'tskip 2 days. Do it every day. The same time every day is good, too.

3. Paint for fun. If you've set it aside for a while, paint onlywhat you want to paint, what you're driven to paint. Play a bit.Give yourself premission to paint awful stuff. Give yourselfpermission to paint wild stuff. Look at what happens and solidify theparts that you like.

BEND, OR

Rick and I visit to Bend to hike and chase waterfalls. Today we drive to Tumalo Falls, which we missed on previous trips because of snow. We hike up to middle Tumalo Falls, and take lots of photos. I have discovered that if I give Rick a camera, he will walk slowly enough to allow me to take pictures. Clever, eh?
Now it is late afternoon, and I feel a need to paint. I send Rick to the swimming pool, and find a parking area with a great sky view. I love this time of day. The clouds are almost certain to be warming in color, even if sunset is hours away. There are plenty of shadows and nuances to the light.
Today, the clouds are changing so fast, I can hardly make two brush strokes that still represent the shapes. Again, I must choose and paint without an overall plan. I struggle with the foreground grasses. They are very light, and their color pulls some of the warms of the clouds together, yet I don’t want them to dominate the painting. When I leave, I feel satisfied that I have captured the feel, if not the fact, of the scene.

TRILLIUM LAKE, OR

It is harder to get up before sunrise this morning. During the night I thought I heard great winds (probably trucks on the highway), and kept listening for sounds of rain, wondering whether there would be good enough weather to paint out at all. So I am delighted to rise to the sound of my cell phone alarm, look out the window, and see Orion shining clear and strong in a black, black sky. I dress in minutes, knock on Irene’s door, and microwave my breakfast and her coffee. Then we head for the lake.

Along the dam levee, there is already someone parked to watch the sunrise. We choose a spot where we have a view of Mt. Hood, plus a bit of lightening sky to the right. There isn’t a whiff of cloud, so I compose my painting around the dark shapes of hill and mountain, and the lozenge of lake.

The show begins. I am amazed that every morning there is a new display. Every morning the footlights are a different color, the sky costumed in different clouds, the dance of the wind taking its skirts this way or that. Colored light bounces on fir trees, rock, snow fields and water with subtlely different intensity.

As the sun comes up, a wind stirs the lake, then builds to a blow, dropping the temperature. But the show is worth braving the weather. Gradually, sun hits the snow fields on Mt. Hood, then the dark green high rolling hills, then the oranges of the lower elevation trees. Lights up on grass and water. The lake is awake now, the day begun.

TIMBERLINE SUNRISE

Miraculously, I am out of bed in time for another sunrise. Consider going to someplace new, like Trillium Lake, but decide that Timberline is closer, and the sunrise won’t be the same anyway. The van knows the way.

The sunrise is, indeed, quite different from yesterday. It reminds me of my resolve, made while in Hawaii, to walk down to the river every non-rainy day for the sunset. (And have I done that? Noooo.)

This time, I set my colors a bit earlier in the show. I am painting a very small canvas, so I zoom in on the golden glow just above the ridge. Put the colors down with a certain intensity, trying to compensate for the lack of light in the van. The painting comes together quickly.

Once my painting is finished, I pull out the camera for the rest of the show, drive to a few new viewpoints, and capture some variety. Even the side of the sky away from the sun has subtle and exciting color play. I am a confirmed sunrise lover. (As long as they aren’t too early.)