Ive decided to keep up the small painting projects. I find them helpful in learning about color, composition, and value. Also they aren’t quite as intimidating as a 4 foot expanse of canvas.
This weekend I did a flurry of paintings over 4 days. I started with looking out the window at the view of east Cambridge. The lower half of the painting is somewhat lost, but I’m happy with the courthouse tower and the trees around the tall building.
The second painting was from a photo of Maine. I am both pleased and annoyed with this painting. While the underlying structure came out correct, I was in a hurry when I painting the light plane of the tree trunk in and it feels generic.
On a snowy Saturday I tried out a portrait experiment, once again working from a photo. While the resemblance from the model is definitely off, I like the looseness of it. When I paint I tend towards tight control of detail, so relaxing a bit was both exciting and frustrating.
I followed up the portrait with a botched figure study that was so bad I’m not even including it. However, Sunday night I came back to the easel to try again and am somewhat satisfied. As I said to Lance: Once I figure out color mixing, values, and anatomy, I might be a decent painter. 😉
adam's art work 