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[ Home | Gallery 1 | Gallery 2 | Gallery 3 | Bio | Links Page ]
Please contact the artist for a price list
 Cleawox Lake 11x14, oil |
 Peace on the River 11x14, oil |
 SeaSide House 9x12, oil |
 Boduk's Meadow 11x14, oil |
 Red Barn 11x14, oil |
 Heceta Head Lighthouse 10 x 8, oil on canvas |
 Cow Pasture 12 x 9, oil on canvas |
 Alder Dune Campground 10x8, oil on canvas |
 Yellow Rhody 11x14, oil on canvas |
The French Impressionists are given credit as the artists who started the plein air movement. During the mid 19th century, Claude Monet, Edouard Manet, Edouard Degas, August Renoir and others left their studios and set up their paints and easles in the fields of nature. It was called painting en plein air (in the open air).
Using Nature as one's studio is not for every artist. For me it brings a special contentment, and it's the kind of painting I always wanted to do.
It requires carrying all my supplies and equipment to where I want to paint~usually not too far from my car! It means painting fast, before the shadows change, altering the whole scene before me. I paint on fairly small canvasses so that I can finish a painting in about two hours.
Flying insects are attracted to oil paint, and the ones that don't die in my paint pester me, if I don't use insect repellant.
I wear a visor to protect my eyes from the sun~and a large sun umbrella, if necessary. Sun block is always a good idea.
Why go to all this trouble? If you have to ask, don't bother. I've had wild birds and squirrels come closer to me than they ordinarily would, as I sit quietly painting. I've seen that moment of "Oh-h-h-h!" as the light shifts and the color of the water turns a lovely green in just one spot. These are experiences I never have in my studio.
For more information on plein air painting, please go to the ARTLEX link on my links page and look at Impressionism and En Plein Air.