Working off an photo I took along the Potomac River for structure, I wanted to see if I could get the feeling of a misty morning. Cerulean blue, titanium white, yellow ochre, carmine, ultramarine, and brown madder.
Month: January 2016
More snow, more painting
I started this earlier today before shoveling. Those lumps behind the street lamp are our cars. They still look like that. I’ve never seen a snow storm like this.
I painted this on a light blue Fabriano Tiziano pastel paper. The blue comes through a little on the snow. My colors were Prussian blue, Brown Madder, and titanium white. There is a minuscule touch of lemon yellow mixed with those colors to get the light bulb.
I wish I had deviated from reality more and positioned the street lamp a little further left and the tree further right. Anyway, here’s a closeup:
“We’re going to be sinked for sure!”
The title quote is from my almost five year old daughter when she came downstairs this morning and saw all the snow.
It’s a good day for gray paintings. Not that I pulled it off, but I liked the house light coming through the tree up the street so I tried a quick sketch. I started this while it was still pretty dark out, and in the middle of it the winds picked up and the scene turned all white before resolving to gray again.
We’re only halfway through this storm, but we’re already pretty buried.
Time for coffee.
Moonlight over Casco Bay–an experiment
I haven’t worked much with nighttime paintings, but have been inclined to give them a try considering I’ve spent so much time driving home in the dark this winter and observing the light (what little of it there is) around the trees and houses.
I’ve also been thinking back to a trip we took to Maine a few years ago. Trying some of Turner’s techniques I constructed this scene from an evening photo I took out on Casco Bay. I used the photo for reference but manufactured the nighttime effects based on imagination and reference to other paintings. I was interested in showing the two light sources–the cool light of the moon and the warm light of the town–coming together on the water. To do this I used a blue pastel paper, with ultramarine and sepia to get the darks, mixing in a little permanent green olive on the near island. Titanium white and yellow ochre provided the light sources. More to come along these lines, I think. Thanks for reading.
Corey Aber 