After the storm

Today's practice, "After the storm," 8 x 10 watercolor, 300 lb. d'Arches cold press paper.

Spirits, and colors, lift when a storm passes, as it did yesterday.
Clouds still crowd the sky, but the sun, and light, and therefore color seem more intense, especially as the days wane and wavelengths grow longer.
It's time to get outside, drink in the vibrant smells, and watch the skies as moisture, contrasts and change explode in color.
Today's practice, playing with color combinations and applications. Not for sale.
Composition  inspired by the work of talented artist Stephen Rooney of Northern Ireland.

Where humans are small

"Sunset Storm on the Great Plains," 11 x 14, watercolor, 300 lb. d'Arches cold press paper

"Out here is the sky," I've written of my fascination with the dominating skies of the Great Plains and West, which influence so much of my art work.
My computer is full of photos I and others have taken of the skies, the clouds. They are fluid and expansive in an expansive, but arid land.
I'm always reminded of Willa Cather's sentence, she a child of the great Plains,  in Death Comes for the Archbishop: "Elsewhere the sky is the roof of the world; but here the earth was the floor of the sky."
I've neglected painting the skies recently, and my art has suffered, and my wife is prodding me to return. I've learned more about color and composition and more in the past year, but the skies are calling.
Thus this morning's lesson, reflecting my learning, and my yearning, for the wide open spaces.
Palette--orange, magenta, Alizarin Crimson, Opera, Ultamarine blue, touch of Phalo Blue.

Where the pavement ends--stories and paintings

"Morning in Ocate," 11 x 15 watercolor, 300 lb. d'Arches cold press paper

I love unpaved roads, especially remote state highways that are still just gravel, or dirt. They beckon with discovery and stories, and paintings.
Six years ago, this Labor Day weekend, I found one on a New Mexico map, and set out, leaving I-40 at Endee just across the state line, onto the back roads of little traffic and wide open spaces.

Unpaved NM 120, the smooth part in the Sangre de Cristos

Heading for 17 miles of unpaved state highway, NM 120,  in the Sangre de Cristo mountains south of Angel Fire. Some of it was well maintained. Other portions were barely two rocky ruts in dense forest.

Where the pavement ends, I found the community of Ocate, on the mountain branch of the old Santa Fe trail, with an old adobe with colorful rusting tin roof that just begged to be painted. 

It must be an old store, and I've tried painting it several times. I'm still not satisfied, in doing justice to that beautiful roof, but this is the latest version--painted this time with more color, more freedom and without looking at the photo. I'm happier with the roof, but it, like the unpaved highways continues to beckon.
There are two other unpaved stretches state highways I've traveled in New Mexico...NM450 west of Kenton, Oklahoma, and NM 112, through the Jicarilla Apache reservation south of El Vado Lake.
I have found others that need to be traveled, mostly in the southwestern part of the state. 

In the meantime, I'll settle for memories and watercolors. Also, here's the 3 x 4 preliminary value sketch. I chose yellow-orange, blue green and  blue violet for a triad from the color wheel for color harmony.
If you care to travel those back roads, search "back roads journal" on this blog. Here are the link to two of them, and the first painting in Ocate, from six years ago.

https://clarkcoffee.blogspot.com/2013/09/back-road-journal-new-mexico-ii.html
https://clarkcoffee.blogspot.com/2013/09/new-mexico-provoked-painting.html

What the world needs now

"Intimacy," 5 x 7 watercolor,  140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press paper

Thoughts while watching two rescued rivals for attention and space, decide it is time for a nap.
Yin and Yang?
Here's to Sophie, (alpha female, orange and white), and Snoops, (curious provocateur, tuxedo cat). They know what the world needs now.

Different strokes

"Taos Dreaming," 12 x 12 acrylic

The annual Oklahoma Visual Arts Coalition 12" x 12" art fundraiser will be Sept. 20 this year at 50 Penn Place.
Having joined and been invited, I agreed to participate, but the challenge doubled down, because I haven't figured out watercolor on canvas yet.
The result was an adventure into acrylics and palette knives on canvas, trying to create in the huge shadow left by the late Regina Murphy of the Paseo Arts District. I'd purchased many of her art materials earlier this year and just had to try. I now have more admiration for her than ever before. 

Regina Murphy's palette knives

Palette knives hold a special place in my memory because I'd seen my Dad and others paint with them in oil. I just had to buy her collection for that reason, and then the challenge loomed over me, every time I looked at them.
Different strokes, squared. Painting with knives and acrylics demands new techniques and imagination than with watercolor and brushes. much learned, much more to learn.
Here's the result, after weeks of work, to be dropped off today, on deadline.