Day 24 - Derry Edain Plein Air Day

 Good morning :)  Today's painting was done plein air of the Derry Edain horse farm in Cochranville.  It was a beauty of a day with the early Autumn colors just beginning to pop.  The highlight of the day was when the 2 horses who board on the property came galloping down to greet me and the white horse allowed me to pet her. She was such a gentle giant and not only that, but even bowed to me several times. I truly was honored to have been given this gift from such a beautiful and powerful animal.  White horse energy has been strong in my sphere for at least the past week. Yesterday's painting was one I created before the plein air expedition to the Derry Edain farm as I had the image galloping through my mind for several days..  Connecting with the beautiful white horse on Friday not only was an honor, but felt like an affirmation.  Later, I looked through my photos and realized that the sign flanking the driveway into Derry Edain has a woman in a dress riding on a white horse.  And, as I am writing this post, I looked up the address to the Derry Edain farm and just now realized that it is located onWhite Horse Road.  I do love when synchronicities like this pop up.. to me they are a reassuring nudge from the other side.. :) Scroll down to see pictures of the horses, the farm as well as some possible adjustments I could make to the painting..

Derry Edain, Oil, 11"x14", nfs

When you paint on location, you have to decide what you are going to include and what information is not necessary to your painting.  It is something that challenges me every time and this painting was no exception. After bringing it home and looking at it for awhile, I am thinking it may be better if I crop some of it off.  Since I paint on wood panel, this is something I can do relatively easily with my bandsaw, after the painting dries.  Below are 2 crops I could do. The first is a square and would measure 10"x10". The second is the painting cut directly in half and would measure 7"x11".  Something to ponder.. the question is, is the tree necessary to the story.  Is any of the right hand side of the painting necessary to the story?

Day 13 - Snowhill farms

In keeping with yesterday's plein air theme, today's entry was painted during a recent day when I travel to West Chester.  The landscape in the area I travel to is dotted with natural preserves, horse farms and old estates and this painting was done of the back end of the Snowhill farms horse farm along the Southern edge of Chester County. Sometimes, if I'm painting small, I'll paint a diptych and paint 2 panels simultaneously ..this was one of those times and I painted two views of the same scene.. Below is the right half of the pair and I'll post the other half tomorrow :) That day, I was attracted to the warm grasses and interesting trees on the hill with a backdrop of the beautiful blue sky.. and the fence pattern running along the foreground. 

"Snowhill Farms, Springdell Road" oil on panel, 6"x8"

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Spring Pop Up Show and Sale!

I am busily preparing for my Spring Pop Up Show that I am having with 2 of my painting buds, Russell Slocum and Keith Rentschler.  May 4th and 5th at the Warehouse Studios at 700 Lancaster Ave, Reading, PA.  Stay tuned for more details to come, but know that we will be showcasing 150+ paintings including new pieces as well as archived work, plus prints, cards and commissions specials.  Studio prices, many discounted.... Door prizes, free-with-purchase artwork and a lot more!:) 

Collage of all the paintings from the 2018 30 in 30 painting challenge

The finale of every 30 in 30 includes creating a collage of all of the paintings I created during the challenge.  In the past, it would take me sometimes hours to do this, because I typically painted on a variety of sizes of canvas or panels and I had to figure out how to get them to all fit nicely .  This time around, save for one painting (the plein air I did around the middle of the challenge), I painted on all square panels or canvas.  This made it a relative snap to collage them all in a nice organized way.  I say relative because there was still finagling I had to do.  But it was much easier this time round... 

If you read my first post from this challenge, you will see that I wasn't sure how things were going to work out for me. My son was just getting over a 2 month illness, during which I had spent little or no time in my studio.  I wondered if I would be able to paint every single day... but I decided I neede to do this to push me to get up there!  Things were going great, and then, mid challenge and for a variety of reasons, we decided start my son in cyber school.  I once again wasn't sure what would happen, because I knew that my life was going to be in upheaval for awhile while he transitioned into this type of schooling. I can say this, some life difficulties are hared to work around. But if you have the will and the ideas, you can generally find the time to create.  There were days I didn't get up into my studio until after dinner and painted until 9 or 10.  I didn't care for that at all.  But I wanted complete this challenge with all 30 paintings this time so, I forced myself to do it.  I am so glad I did!  Below is the collage of all the paintings and I love seeing them all together!

And finally, credit must be given to my husband who always picks up on the chores and cooking that I can't do because I'm designing a painting or actually painting the painting... or I'm just too tired! Thanks hubby... <3

And thanks again to you for reading this and following me through this challenge.  All the positive feedback has been wonderful!  

Day 22 of the 30 in 30 challenge - Everything's fine

I spent a lot of time today preparing for tomorrow as I am going on my first ever plein air painting expedition with some artist friends of mine.  Plein air simply means that I will be painting outside in nature, instead of in my studio.   I have been planning and studying all about plein air painting for some time now and over the past month or so, with the help of my husband and many online examples, I have designed a plein air easel to take with me tomorrow.  I was going for simplicity, light weight and usability.  I finished things off today by cutting my pallet so it will hang nicely on the tripod (which you can see in the picture below) and making some wet panel holders for easy transportation of finished paintings.  When I finished with all of that, I didn't have a lot of time left to actually paint a painting.  I had originally wanted to try the system out outside.  But it got too late, so I tried it out in my studio, using a reference photo, instead of the real McCoy... (a.k.a. nature...)  I used a photo I took awhile back of a many layered landscape with some pretty interesting color shifts.  Below my painting I included a picture of the easel.  

Everything's Fine, oil on panel, 6"x6",
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Amazing plein air easel system my husband and I designed
Love how everything came together...

Just want to say, I love the easel as it fits all of the requirements I was going for, and more! And I want to thank my awesome husband for doing almost all of the work to design and build it!

Close up of inside paint storage area.. Can also see how the pallet attaches to the tripod.