Quick New Sketch, and found an old painting

Posted on 02/12/2014 by adamleveille

Last night I stepped into the studio for a quick landscape sketch. I’ve been thinking a lot about Andrew Wyeth (having just finished his biography) His father NC Wyeth used to tell him “paint the massive forms”. It seems odd, given Andrew Wyeth’s propensity for detail and texture, but it’s good advice nonetheless.

The sketch was done in an hour, from drawing to finish. It’s obviously rough around some edges, but I’m quite happy with the overall feel. Definitely more painterly than my usual work.

Also, in rearranging my space I stumbled across this painting from a last year. I’d posted a preview of it, but it never appeared in finished form. It’s a little heavy on the saturated greens, but I still think it’s a nice little painting.

Winter Field Sketch : Oil on board. 9″x12″ 2014

Access Road : Oil on board. 9″x12″ 2013

An Old House

Posted on 10/21/2013 by adamleveille

I started this painting a week or two ago. I’ve jumped up to a larger size: 16″x20″ and I like the flexibility it allows in painting greater detail if I want. It also takes more time – I think I’ve spent 3-4 sessions of 3-5 hours each on this painting.

The source material is from my last NH trip, and I was really trying to capture that oppressive summer day. There may be a few details that need tweaking as I move forward but I think it is 99% finished.

An Old House : Oil on board, 16″x 20″ 2013

Landscape sketch

Posted on 10/16/2013 by adamleveille

A quick oil sketch of a marsh near my dad’s farm. Im working on a larger piece that’s taking a bit more time to complete. This was done with some of the leftover paints on my palette to keep them from going to waste. I did it unless the hour and I’m quite pleased with the results.

More Nudes.

Posted on 09/24/2013 by adamleveille

So I’m still working on painting skin tones in preparation for a series of paintings I’m working on. These are all done alla prima style. I’m getting a little bit better hang of recognizing that the skin tones on the palette are going to be 100X too vibrant on the canvas, so thats been helpful.

untitled : Oil on board. 5.5″ x 9″ 2013

untitled : Oil on board. 9″x12″ 2013

Nudie Paintings beware!

Posted on 09/16/2013 by adamleveille

This weekend I spent a bunch of time tackling skin tones. I painted four figure studies and what I have come away with is : Skin tones are HARD!

Almost every single time I mixed a color on my palette to what I thought was an appropriate, pale, neutral skin tone that same color looked like garish clown makeup on the actual painting.

Overall, though, the process moved from clumsy, to awkward, to frustrating, and finally landed on “…meh.” On the last attempt I switched from Ti White which had been making things a big chalky mess over to Flemish and Flake whites. This helped enormously in brightening the colors without flattening them. It’s a shame that a tiny tube of Flemish white costs 3X the giant tube of Ti.

Last attempt and the best of you ignore the face. Oil on board 8″x10″

First attempt. Somehow in focusing on the colors I forgot how anatomy works. Oil on board 8″x10″

Third attempt. Starting to understand that colors are good. Oil on board 8″x10″

Second attempt. Better with the anatomy, colors are a chalky mess. Oil on board. 8″x10″

Acadia Painting 5/5

Posted on 09/06/2013 by adamleveille

On the last day of vacation Lance and I once again went to the loop road and climbed out on the rocks. It was the perfect, beautiful, sunny way to end a long relaxing, exciting, art-filled week.

Otter Cliffs : Oil on Board. 9″x12″ 2013. painted on site.

Best of all, I got a great painting out of it and I learned that, when standing in direct sunlight, your colors are probably darker than you imagine 🙂

Also, there were a few other sketches that I did from around the island.

The Rocks at Seawall : Pencil. 5″x7″ 2013

Upper Hadlock Pond : Pencil. 5″x7″ 2013

Some Notes on Waves : Pencil. 5″x7″ 2013

View of Little Long Pond : Pencil. 5″x7″ 2013

View From Beech Mountain : Pencil. 5″x7″ 2013

Acadia 4/5

Posted on 09/05/2013 by adamleveille

Almost done with all my Acadia stuff. The last couple of days there I convinced Lance to come to the rocky side of the island with me and he hung out and read while I painted.

It was rather beautiful to be standing on the edge of the rocks gazing into the ocean. Until the ocean started getting closer as the tide came in. Lance nabbed this photo.

Adam painting.

The painting was done on half of a 9×12″ board. It came out decent. One of the things I caught myself doing was compressing some of the elements to make them fit onto the board. The small hash marks on the top corners are from small bull-dog clips that I use to stack wet paintings without them touching one another.

Ocean Rocks : Oil on Board. 9″x5.5″ 2013. painted on site.

Acadia Painting 3/5

Posted on 09/04/2013 by adamleveille

If you’ve ever been to Mt. Desert you know that Maine fog is a mysterious and frustrating thing! On Wednesday I dropped Lance off in Bar Harbor, where the afternoon sun was dappling the lawn of the common. I made my way towards the ocean and upon reaching the rocks was immediately engulfed in fog.

The thin line in the back of the painting is the same beach we’d been to the day before. Suffice to say I’m glad we made it to the beach when it was sunny.

Sand Beach In Fog : Oil on Board. 9″x12″ 2013. painted on site.

Acadia Painting 2/5

Posted on 09/03/2013 by adamleveille

So before August of last year I hadn’t done much oil painting since I graduated college in 2002. As Lance and I were packing for Acadia in 2012 I decided, on a whim, to bring along my old box of oil paints and some masonite panels. The first full day of vacation Lance and I hiked along the edge of Somes Sound – the fjord that cuts up the center of Mount Desert Island.

After a few hours of hiking we cut down to the water level and I decided that if I was going to paint, that was the time. It was awkward and windy, and the first result was clumsy, but it started me down the path to where I am today. (click photos to enlarge)

Somes Sound : Oil on masonite. 9″x12″ (NFS) Painted on site.

Last week I revisited the spot to repaint it on the one year anniversary.

The Flying Mountain trail winds along the edge of a steep embankment a few hundred feet above the water. The trail is literally cut into the rock face in parts, and offers dramatic views up the Sound and across to Nuremberg and Parkman Mountains.

Setting up my easel on the edge of Flying Mountain. 2013.

I was able to get a glimpse of my original painting site (the nearer of the two points on the right), which was under water due to the tide, so I decided to stop where I was, perched on the edge of a giant granite boulder tumble, and set up my easel.

I spent about 2 peaceful hours there. Almost no sounds except the occasional boat motoring up the fjord. I spotted an osprey hunting below me, and was visited by a remarkably curious/fearless red squirrel. The resulting painting perfectly captures the late afternoon feeling. It’s a little sweet, and the water on the right side got muddied with some stray orange, but overall I’m happy with it.

Somes Sound Overlook : Oil on board. 9″x12″ 2013. painted on site.

Earlier Tuesday morning Lance and I had gone to Sand Beach, on the eastern-most part of Mount Desert Island. The beach is a tiny channel with steep cliffs rising on either side, and a stunning view of the Beehive Mountain directly behind it. I spent a good amount of time sketching the cliffs.

Looking out from Sand Beach : Graphite 5″x7″ 2013

Looking North from Sand Beach : Graphite 5″x7″ 2013

Looking out from Sand Beach : Graphite 5″x7″ 2013

Acadia Painting 1/5

Posted on 09/02/2013 by adamleveille

August is incredibly busy at my job, and the month ended with a much needed, and much enjoyed vacation to Acadia park in Maine. For those who are unfamiliar Acadia is on Mt. Desert Island – a weird and beautiful place, complete with dramatic mountains, rugged cliffs jutting into the ocean, gorgeous boreal forests, a fjord, and truly breathtaking views.

It is a landscape that inspired artists such as Edward Hopper, Frederick Church, and Fitz Hugh Lane. And me. I brought along my painting kit and my sketchbook again this year and spent 5 of the seven days making art.

First up is Seawall, painted on Monday morning. Seawall is a cobble beach on the lower east side of the island, staring off into the Atlantic ocean and the outlier islands. Across the road are tall, eerie pine forests and quiet marshes.

Painting the ocean is challenging. It’s always moving. It was foggy one moment, and sunny the next. By the time I finished drawing, mixing colors, and started painting the rocks in the bottom of the painting had half vanished under the tide. An hour later they were completely submerged. And, of course, the composition is a little bland, with the horizon cutting just about halfway through the painting. But still, it was the start of a very productive week!

Seawall : Oil on board. 9″x12″ 2013. Painted on site.

A panorama of the marsh behind Seawall beach.

Graphite studies of the rocks, waves, and vistas of Seawall beach. 5″x7″ 2013

Erased Selfie

Posted on 08/04/2013 by adamleveille

I drew a selfie and then I erased it…

Selfie : Graphite on paper. 5″x9″ 2013

Yellow House

Posted on 07/29/2013 by adamleveille

Its difficult to photograph a wet painting and not get a bunch of glare so…sorry for that.

New idea I’ve been playing with. You saw the sketch last week. Here’s the finished (almost) product.

Yellow House : Oil on board. 9″x12″ 2013

House in Streetlight : Pencil 3″x4″ 2013

Sketchbook drawings

Posted on 07/24/2013 by adamleveille

A pair of small drawings from my sketchbook. I usually do a value/composition drawing before I start a painting. First is the house across the street in the glow of a streetlamp. Second is a prep drawing for my last painting.

House in Streetlight : Pencil 3″x4″ 2013

Farm Drawing : Pencil. 3″x4″ 2013

Heatwave

Posted on 07/22/2013 by adamleveille

I haven’t been able to beat the heatwave we’ve been in for the past couple of weeks. Its tough painting when it’s 95 degrees. I paint in rubber gloves, and after about twenty minutes the sweat is trickling from the gloves down my arms. Nice, huh?

Despite the oppressive temperatures I did eek out this painting. I spent a lot of time mixing the base colors for the greens, the greys, and the blues ahead of time. I think that definitely clarified a lot of the forms.

It’s one of the small size paintings at 9″x12″ but it feels much more finished than a sketch. I may come back and revisit this idea on a larger scale. Hopefully the heat will have broken by Friday when I get some free time again.

Road and Farm : 9″x12″ Oil on board. 2013

Small drawing

Posted on 07/13/2013 by adamleveille

Ugh. This drawing came out looking like a pile of trash.

Zorn Palette Experiment

Posted on 07/02/2013 by adamleveille

This painting is a 1 hour sketch of my little suede teddy bear using the Zorn palette.

Anders Zorn was a Swedish landscape and portrait painter – a contemporary and competitor of John Singer Sargent and Joaquin Sarolla y Bastida. Zorn often (but not always) limited his palette to just four colors: ivory black, flake white, yellow ochre, and vermillion red (I swapped in Cad Red Med.)

Limiting a palette is always an interesting challenge because you are forced to work less on perceived colors and more from value, form, and color temperature. The Zorn palette actually gives you a great range of tones, both warm and cool.

I painted teddy after doing the color chart. My palette was full of all of the mixtures and I think I probably should have limited them even further. Also – canvas paper sucks. Literally. I would put down a brushstroke and it would get sucked into the tooth of the canvas almost immediately. For the next experiments I have added extra gesso to the paper to help seal it up.

Zorn Palette Teddy : Oil on unmounted canvas. 2013

Zorn Palette. Colors are mixed 3/1 approx.

Summer Fields

Posted on 07/02/2013 by adamleveille

A couple weeks ago I went back to NH to get some reference photos for new paintings. It was a helpful trip – the one downside being that I was photographing at mid-day under a blazing summer sun with virtually no clouds. That translates into a lot of flatness because shadows are dropped directly below things.

This is a small sketch and I’m not particularly thrilled. Something is definitely off with the mountains in the background and I can’t figure out what. The foreground is a little muddy in the use of greens, as are the 3-4 big trees in the front. Probably doesn’t help that I’m red/green color blind. Also – the camera is turning the greens orange again.

Road and Mountains : Oil on board. 9″x12″ 2013

Weekend Work

Posted on 06/24/2013 by adamleveille

It’s been all quiet on the artistic front for a few weeks. One reason is that I’ve been reading and practicing some color theory techniques – more on that in a few days. But mostly I’ve been away from painting because I was out of source material.

On Friday I went back to my childhood home and spent several hours biking around the fields and farms where I grew up taking tons of photos to work from. It was an interesting experience that tugged at a few memories, which is exactly the reason why I’m painting this subject matter to start with.

Below is one sketch from the weekend – a mirror to Field in Winter (same location) and also the finished photo of A Path from earlier this year. It’s been finished for a while, I just hadn’t got around to photographing it.

Field in Summer : Oil on board, 9″x12″ 2013

A Path : Oil on Board, 14″x18″ 2013

Fluffy clouds

Posted on 06/07/2013 by adamleveille

Ok, This one got a little out-of-control and Thomas Kincaide-ish. Another experiment using Liquin and layers and getting mixed results.

New easel

Posted on 05/18/2013 by adamleveille

Just got a new easel set up in my studio! Much sturdier than the aluminum travel easel I was using.

And I’ve almost finished a new painting! Part of the Echoes series. Mostly happy with the result, but as always I can see areas where I’d improve it.

Working

Posted on 05/12/2013 by adamleveille

Feeling energized from Open Studios, I spent this whole weekend painting. And a little bit of it working on a chair. But mostly painting.

I finished “A road #2”, and made a lot of headway on two new paintings. I’m very happy with the one below, other than that its a little happy and sunny and I think it needs a wee bit more melancholy to it.

Open Studios Take Away

Posted on 05/06/2013 by adamleveille

Just finished up Somerville Open Studios and an outstanding weekend! I had about 200 people come through my space. I sold five pieces: two “When These Are Gone” watercolors, one of the “Echoes” oil paintings, and two figure drawings! I gave away dozens of my postcards and business cards. It was a significantly better event than last year.

Probably most important thing I took away from the weekend: incredible perspective on my work. Repeatedly trying to explain my process or ideas in 30 seconds or less really helps crystallize them for me. It’s also interesting to see what types of work people respond to. I put one idea into a piece and that is what makes it interesting for me, but viewers bring their own attachments and responses and will get something completely different from it.

I’ve got a lot of notes to make while the weekend is still fresh in my mind, and then a lot of work to make in the coming months.

When I am Gone (number 17)

Progress

Posted on 04/26/2013 by adamleveille

Progress made on a small painting of Swan’s Island. Hopefully it will be ready by Open Studios next week!

Swan’s Island Road #2 : 9’x12″ Oil on Board

Pownal & Powerlines

Posted on 04/13/2013 by adamleveille

Two medium scale (18″x14″) paintings brought much closer to completion this weekend. I grew up playing around the powerlines near my father’s house.

The Pownal landscape was done from a few photos taken on Easter at my brother’s house. I was very excited when I started it. I have grown considerably less excited as it progressed. Painting trees with no leaves on them is hard.

I need to let some elements dry before going back in and adding some details, like the actual power lines.

Pownal : Oil on board, 14″x18″ 2013

Power Lines : Oil on Board : 14″x18″ 2013

Barn – Finished… I hope

Image

Barn - Finished... I hope

Here is the most recent iteration of the Barn. I added on the canoe, some details along the windows on the red side, cleaned up the tree and bushes on the right, fixed the sky a bit, and added some depth to the trees on the right. I hope this is the final version Time will tell.

10 Landscape Sketches

Posted on 04/06/2013 by adamleveille

These are little thumbnails I do as warmups before actual painting. I usually work from photos on my phone and the corresponding sketch is about the same size – usually in the 3-4″ range.

: Davis Square

: Great Cranberry #2 Pencil on Paper. 3″x5″

: Great Cranberry #1

: Pownal

: Random Field #1

: Random Field #2

: Random Road #1

: Random Road #2

: Swan’s Island Sketch #1

: Swan’s Island Sketch #2 Pencil on Paper. 3″x5″

Kinda, sorta finished & a new experiment

Posted on 03/30/2013 by adamleveille

I’m still using my dad’s barn as inspiration for some paintings, but I’ve moved outside this time. I took some photos when I was visiting before Christmas. The low winter sun caught the barn just as we were returning from a walk. I keep thinking it’s finished, but I still want to go into the painting and fix things. The left side of the painting feels a little empty, but I didn’t want to paint in the teal Subaru thats parked there in real life. (and yes, the barn actually is red on two sides, raw barnboard on the others)

Untitled 18″x14″ Oil on board. 2013.

Also, this weekend I did a little experiment with drawing/painting. I used another photo from New Hampshire for reference. The medium is oil thinned out with a ton of turpentine so as to give it a real washy, watercolory feel. Good lord you need some real ventilation when working with that stuff! I’m overall happy with the result, but completely not sure what its about or where it’s going. It feels a little like the ink drawings I did in Fables, so maybe it will lead back in that direction soon enough.

Stream Painting : Oil on gessoed paper. 18″x24″ 2013

Field in Winter

Posted on 03/23/2013 by adamleveille

Short study in oil.

Field in Winter : Oil on Board 9″x12″

The Old Barn

Posted on 03/09/2013 by adamleveille

The old barn at my dad’s house – where I grew up – has always been a place of mystery and exploration for me. There is something very evocative of the geometry of the beams, the varying levels of height, the walls perforated by shafts of sunlight, which bounce around and illuminate.

I’ve been working on this imagery for a little while, and while I’m not sure if these paintings are exactly what I’m looking for I plan on spending more time with the subject matter.

Old Loft Study

Old Hay – Oil on board. 14″x18″ 2013 (NFS)

Barn Arch

Barn Window Drawing – Pencil on paper. 2″x4″ 2013

Barn Corner Drawing

Barn Ceiling – Oil on board. 14″ x 18″ 2013

Barn Arch. Pencil on paper. 3″ x 5″ 2013

adam's art work

the website of adam Leveille

Tag Archives: 2013