Grand Lake Weekend

While Julia and I were painting last weekend off of Hwy 34, a young man from the East coast stopped and asked if he could take our photos. We said, sure and I added, only if you send them to me! Today, the photos arrived. So here we are. What a great day it was, too. Below is the painting I did that afternoon.

This painting is 14x11. It was the second one of the day, on the first day and we started about 2 p.m. or so. I enjoyed painting this very much. I was fortunate, because when I started there were two "tractors" here. I picked this one, and about halfway through this painting, the other tractor was put to work. When I came back through this valley on my way home Sunday night, all the hay had been picked up.I liked the pattern of the silhouetted hay bales leading the eye to the haybaler, surrounded by the bright field.

The Haystack, 16x12 above, was the second painting on Saturday, and was started about 1 p.m. Again, I had a great time painting this. I was struck by the free form of this haystack, and its massive size. I loved the way the light was skipping across it from behind illuminating the planes with the contrasting blue mountain behind it. I still want to rework the sage along the fence. Certainly not looking very sage like. But other than that, I will leave it as is. I used a pencil to put in the woven wire fence in the wet paint. I took this painting in to Kevin's class this morning  for critique. Our assignment for this month had been to do an "expressive" painting and this is about expressive as I get. He said I did a great job, and he really liked this piece. He liked the Haybaler, too.

New Growth, 8x10, was painted Sunday morning. I had intended to paint the Colorado River, so I set up on a strip of land that came into the river to paint the river coming right at me. Then I saw this dark mass of evergreens with some light filtering through, with the beetle kill on one side and the new growth looking so vibrant in the front, I switched gears immediately. I am always amazed at how mother nature regenerates. Grand County is covered in beetle kill, and/or clear cutting where the dead trees have already been removed. But the flip side is now the contours of the landscape are visible, views are spectacular, and new growth is springing forth. If I were to do this again I would pay more attention to the filtering light. I made those areas too large. They should be carving out the evergreens in a more subtle way.