More about snow.

Painting snow is like painting a rainbow.   It's very subtle but the hues are all over the color wheel.  In this painting the snow is blue, blue purple, red purple, yellow, some soft streaks of orange, and a little very dark green for shadows.  It's very instructive to paint snow.  Although I'm painting from my iPad that is a photo I took, I make a point to observe snow in sun and shadow as I travel to and from our gallery.

Woke up to this

We won't be going in to the gallery today since the road has to be plowed.  The "less than an inch"
forecasted turned out to be more.  It's beautiful but cold.  Here are some pictures taken from the windows early this morning.

Taken from the living room window.

Just outside our bedroom the Juncos are cleaning up the bird feeder.

Looking down into the "garden" from our bedroom.

Looking up toward the national forest.

I'll be working on my snow painting at the gallery tomorrow.  Stay tuned.

Learning from painting

I have been busy playing tourist and having great fun with my husband's sister and her husband.  Got back to painting the other day.  I started a snow painting (from a photograph taken while we were out snowshoeing) on dark Art Spectrum burgundy paper.  The paper is 9x12 and the painting will be 8x10.  The edges allow me to try out the pastels before committing.  It's been a while since I've used dark paper and I'm enjoying the change.  And I'm enjoying the lessons I'm absorbing in this project.

What have I learned so far?

First, snow on dark paper requires pastels at least a couple of steps darker on the value scale.  In fact
everything requires adjustments of values.

Second, if you are painting trees on a slanted hill there seems to be a tendency to make them slanted.
I found that to keep that from happening I had to lay in some straight, vertical lines to remind me
to keep the trees vertical.

Third, painting small trunks in the distance requires drawing the trees in segments rather than trying
to lay in a long line.  I also found that I was gripping the pastel tightly to control it.  However, when I relaxed my grip the process was much easier.

Here is the quick sketch.

After sketching in the main objects I started laying in some pastels.  I decided not to do an underpainting.  Look at how slanted the trees want to be.  I find that taking pictures of a work
in progress allows me to see problems easily.

  And here's where I am at this time.

As you can see I straightened the evergreens and am starting to put in the aspens.

Let's hear it for the color!

I have hundreds, if not thousands,  of photos of scenes around Cloudcroft, Texas, parts of Mexico, and Colorado.  Have you ever had the experience of looking through a bunch of photos and none of them really grab you?

That was what happened today.  Of course my reaction on another day will undeniably be different.  I finally picked a photo and figured out the crop for a more interesting scene but the inspiration was somewhat lacking.  Except for the color.  So that's what I did.  I went for the color.   My concentration was on the color and I did change quite a few of the elements - the path, the rocks, some trees.

When the color sings, it seems, most anything is possible.  Here is what I painted today.  I've already identified a few things I want to improve.  But, let's hear it for the color!

Determining the size of a painting

One of the first things I do when I paint from a photograph is to determine whether the shape of the painting will be square, a landscape rectangle, or a portrait rectangle.  Then I decide what size it will be.

This last decision, more often than not, seems to be made by instinct.  Generally I tend to make more intimate landscapes smaller and the more encompassing ones larger.  This is by no means a rule.

Last year I began painting some small landscapes in sizes, 4x6, 5x7, and 6x8.  I was really not sure that I would be able to paint small.  I had been painting mostly 8x10, 9x12, 11x14, 12x16 and some larger.

I found that I like painting smaller.  Sometimes I will start a couple of 5x7s or 6x8s in one plein air
session.  Check out my paintings on my websitewww.donnagordonpastels.com

What size paintings do you most like to do in pastel?  Why?

Here is the painting I posted earlier at the end of the day.  Not sure if it's finished.

Sizes for Pastel Paintings

When I first began painting in pastels, I painted whatever size the painting turned out to be.  I thought that was how artists painted.  Soon, however, I discovered that my paintings required custom framing and that was expensive.  Little by little I discovered that some artists painted for particular frame sizes.  That is what I do now.

But what sizes?

Here's a small painting (5x7) that I started yesterday.

This could easily be done as a larger painting.

What painting sizes do you prefer?