Here's a photo of the finished work that I've decided to title: " Bennett Valley Pond " ~ 28" x 28" ~ oil on canvas ~ 2013 ~
This will be one of my entrees in the Marin County Fair Fine Art Competition that will be juried tomorrow. (June 22, 2013) at the Marin Center Fairgrounds in San Rafael, California.
It represents many hours of painting...
I decided to add a pair of Canada Geese to the painting of the small pond in the vineyards off Bennett Valley Road near Santa Rosa, California that I've been working on. I still have a ways to go, but I'm nearing the finish for sure. This is oil on canvas ~ 28" x 28" ~
Mahalo for stopping in,
Timo
~ Martin's Vineyard ~ oil on cavas ~ 30" x 40" ~ 2013 ~
In the final stages of completion, the oil painting that I'm calling "Martin's Vineyard" is starting to really come into focus. It will be a nice painting when it's done...And, that will be soon...'cause I'm stoked to do a new painting of the Ocean after this Vineyard / Landscape.
Stay tuned for more...Don't go back!...I'll be right away!
Mahalo for visiting my blog.
Aloha, Timo
Martin's vineyard on Sonoma Mountain Road here in Glen Ellen is fairly high up on the mountain, but there's still a bit to look up to from there. The Autumn colors in this backlit afternoon view combine with the cool shadows to give this painting it's full spectrum look. I'm getting looser with my application of pigments as the years roll by...I don't really want a photographic realism. Just a strong suggestion of the subject that occurs when I use the intense color of my memory combined with the reference that the camera gives me. Each new color that I introduce helps create that illusive suggestion.
Softening the shadow colors with liighter shades of cools puts more detail into your imagination, but tends to push it all back away from the yellow underpainting that still dominates the lower third of the canvas...Really bringing that into the area just in front of the viewer. The darker shadow section on the left was roughed in with a mixture of Alizerine Crimson & Ultramarine Blue and it too stays well forward visually, of the other lighter and cooler hues.
A good friend of mine was looking at a finished painting of mine that had taken me many hours to complete, and asked me,"How did you do that?" I took a brief moment to contemplate what he was really wanting to know and realized that it was beyond his experience and couldn't quite be explained in a single sentence or even a paragraph...And then I was inspired to sum it up with the phrase; " One stroke at a time."...Which is why many painters of landscapes shy away from larger size supports and are content to work on small or medium size canvases. I think ...Larger canvas...Larger brushes...More pigment...More fun! Takes longer....More process to enjoy!
Aloha Ohana,
Timo
Continuing to work the upper portions of the compsition with the gradually distancing cool colors of shadow seen through thicker and thicker atmosphere as it recedes further away.
Continuing to paint a somewhat cooler shadow color across the treeline from left to right...Still working with a large (#12) longhandled Flat Hogbristle brush. The scene is backlit by the late afternoon Sunlight...So the colors are dramatic in the contrasts between the bright warms and the cooler darks.
I'm using a fairly large (#14) long handled natural hog bristle flat brush. to work the pigment/medium onto the canvas...A lot of different sorts of movements and stroke directions to keep it interesting and the results feeling natural. Still underpainting a bit but starting to layer some shadow colors over my bright underpainting.
Laying in my bright yellows over the stark white gessoed surface of the canvas really helps keep them as vibrant as they need to be in the final aspect of the painting. Even though there won't be nearly that much showing by then.
I started a new painting night before last on a commercially built 30" x 40" canvas that was part of a group of supports traded to me for a resoration job that I'm doing for a friend.
This is the result of the first session of underpainting. What follows will be modified by these first colors that go on the canvas.
I painted this manufactured 18" x 24"canvas panel from a photo that my friend Rick had taken sometime before we arrived, of the gorgeous view looking down through the Kalalau Valley to the Pacific Ocean. I did it in a direct ala prima plein air style even though my reference was a photoprint. I did this painting in about 5 hours.
I'm still working on this painting of Sonoma Creek...I just took a little time off for the Holiday. So here's the current state of progress on it. It's slowly coming into focus here and there. Quite a lot more painting will be required before I can call this one done.
Mahalo for checking in...
Aloha Ohana,
Timo
A lot of my painting experience is about patience and persistance. As I apply more and more strokes and daubs of these pigments that I mix with a mixture of various oils and solvent, I have a vision , not just of the final image I believe will result from all these actions but of the process that will inevitably bring me there if I am patient and persistant in my work.
Many more hours of painting lie ahead to bring this somewhat complex composition of Sonoma Creek into focus.
Mahalo for stopping by.
Aloha, Timo
Another three hour session of painting has brought us to this juncture. I really enjoy watching a picture like this one as it progresses. It begins to take on a life of it's own as the pigments and strokes accumulate. I'm using a full sheet (8 1/2" x 11") paper print of the photo I took a few weeks back on a walk along Warm Springs Road near Kenwood, California as my reference.
Mahalo for checking in... Live in Joy Today!
Aloha, Timo
A few more hours of painting today have advanced the image of Sonoma Creek that I started a couple of days ago. I like where this one is going.
Mahalo for stopping by...
Aloha, Timo
Another two hour painting session has brought it to this state. As I fill in the blank spaces with color, the various elements start becoming identifiable. Wood, Rock, Leaf, Water...
Well... I finally finished the large canvas I have been working on again for a few weeks now.
Title: 'Sonoma Mountain #5' - oil on canvas - 34" x 52" - 2011/2012
price - $6,500.
Mahalo for stopping by...
Aloha, Timo
Well ...I should probably have taken a photo sooner as I've been working on this painting (Sonoma Mountain #5) again for a few days now. It started last year and then got shelved while I worked as much as I was able to on some portrait commissions that came in. However, I have listed it as one of my entrees to the Marin County Fair and they must all be delivered this Friday afternoon to the fairgrounds. So I'm burning the midnight oil to try to get it finished in time to be dry enough to take. Akua has the plan. I just need to keep on slingin' paint!
Mahalo nui loa for visiting my blog. Have a great day!
Aloha, Timo
