Winter Watercolor Blues

Mother nature often arranges her world in such a tidy manner. As an artist I eliminate large amounts of what is visible so that the viewer has the pleasure of imagining more than they see with the naked eye.

Often I imagine more than what is in front of me and sometimes I have a hard time deciding if I should, or should not, add my mental wanderings. I'm thinking I should enjoy tackling this scene again and include the imaginary house way up the hill. It only exists in my mind but then again there just may be a lovely cabin up there just over the top? Was it man or beast who made the tracks going into, or out of, the woods?

Using masking fluid, I was able to preserve the white of the paper and avoided using white paint. It is time consuming but I enjoy it never the less. I worked from a photo but the scene was also visible from my window. Near the completion of the painting I decided to add sparkle paint to emphasize what I saw and felt. I don't know if it made any difference to any viewers but it sure did brighten up my winter blues! Does anything else really matter when all is done?

Watercolor - Commissioned Works

I had been accepted into The Artisans Gallery for a year or two when the owner of the building saw my work and wanted to have an arrangement of 4 pieces. She came to me with her vision of what she wanted and told me she had picked out 2 paintings in the shop and wanted 2 more to go with them.

She had the Village along RT 100 and a side view of The Waitsfield Covered Bridge.

At first she asked me to do another of the bridge and include a big tree on the left. I told her I could give it a try but there was a good reason I hadn't included that tree in all the paintings I had done of that bridge. She accepted that and explained she wanted a painting of the view from the face of the bridge looking towards RT 100 that included her green building on the left. The other view she wanted was looking down the alley between her building and The Spotted Cow restaurant next door. Her vision included warm summer night with people eating outside while others were walking by just enjoying the evening. I told her I was confident about painting the view from the bridge but couldn't guarantee the other one. Putting people in my images is something I rarely do. I also couldn't see this image fitting in with the others she chose.

The quad shows the view from the bridge in the upper left with The Village on RT 100 on the right. After completing the view of the alley I decided to bring along a painting I took off my wall hoping to show her that the alley painting didn't belong in the quad. I never intended to sell "The 1833 Covered Bridge" but it was the perfect piece to finish the quad, so I let it go.

In the end the painting of the night time alley scene ended up on another wall. She was very happy with it by itself. It had been a difficult painting for me to create but I enjoyed the challenge and the final outcome.

It is coming up on 4 years this coming summer since I created these works. It was a fabulous experience and a great boost to my creative self worth at a time when I really needed a boost. I have done other commissioned work but this is the one I will never forget.