Shimmering Light

6"x8" Oil on Linen

Driving through Wiscasset Maine today, I saw this scene. There is nothing amazing about the subject, but I was taken by the light on the water. Although I didn’t have my paints with me, I decided to stop and try something my father-in-law once taught me: Look at the scene and try to remember every detail. Close your eyes and re-build the image in your mind. Open your eyes and see what you missed. Close them again to refine the image and so on…

My father-in-law was not a painter, but he thought like one, and would often use this tool during cold winter days to bring back scenes from summers on the lake. In the end, whether the memory, or the painting, perfectly matches the scene doesn’t matter: the important part is to capture the essence of the mood that inspired you in the first place, so that you can look at it at any time and be transported back to that special place.

Early Morning

5"x 7" Oil on Linen

Starting with a familiar scene, Sarasota Bay where I grew up, this painting gave me an opportunity to study the effects of sunlight. Still working with the contrast between backlit foreground trees and the more obscure background trees, I focused on the few places where light would reach: along the upper tips of the bushes and peaking through the branches. While I typically would paint the background trees in cooler colors for a distance effect, the sun's position directly behind tends to heat them up and allows for the use of warmer colors.

Late Evening

6"x 8" Oil on Linen

Inspired by a photo in a magazine, I wanted to create a painting that had simplicity of color and a very unified tone. I started with a wash of raw sienna and then began painting with as few colors as necessary: alizarin crimson, burnt umber, with some ultramarine blue, cadmium yellow medium, and white.

Here is the study after 30 minutes of painting:

















A few things I would change before attempting this on a larger canvas:

• Bring the boat down (or tree line up) so that the sail breaks the tree line.
• Use lighter values to better distinguish background hill from shoreline trees.

Here is the study with a few more minutes of work to incorporate some of these changes:

Mountain Air

11" x 14" Oil on Canvas

This painting is a study in atmosphere and light. I simply wanted to push the contrast between the distant hills and the foreground trees.

At the same time, I was hoping to utilize the natural contrast of light against dark.