Sky change on sunflower

Lighter Sky, compare with previous posts

It's hard to tell with this photo, but at David Curtis' advice, I changed the sky back to a lighter blue. 

Student's progress

Underpainting for 1st anniversary painting.

Wow, my student is going crazy.  Well, in a good way.  She has been taking lessons for one year and we decided that she would do an anniversary painting.  What is that?  Well, before she came to me she had done a couple of paintings, and one of them was of this photo.  So I asked her NOT to look at the original painting she had done of this subject, and using the methods she has learned, paint it again each year to gauge her progress.  I don't know how long it took her to do her original painting, but this represents only about 1 hour of work.  She is a very speedy painter.  I don't remember her original painting, but I'm anxious to see the comparison when this one is completed. 
I have had some people inquire about lessons, but they never show up.  I understand that everyone lives busy lives these days and it's hard to set time aside to pursue personal goals even if you are retired.  You know what they say about retirement...  You are busier now than before and you wonder how you ever did anything when you were working...or something like that. :)

George Marshall Gallery, Wells, ME

Beside George Marshall Gallery, Well, ME

So I have always loved the scenery near this gallery and took many pictures while I was there.  This area is gorgeous in every season.  I want to paint this area near this river.  Someday...

Stage Fort Park

I went to Stage Fort Park in Gloucester today to finish a painting I had started many years ago.  When I went there that first time, it was my first time meeting David Curtis.  Today I was more or less celebrating all the years I've worked with him on plein air painting.  Today I had finished my painting and was leaving before I ran into David.  Admittedly I started early and was finishing up early (explaining why I was finished before David got around to me).  So David made comments on today's work and also I brought along a few flower paintings I've been working on for his critique.  Regarding yesterday's Scraggly Sunflower painting, he advised me to lighten the sky in order to help to emphasize the yellow more (too many intense colors take away from each other).  Well, the really funny thing about that sky business is that while I was painting it, I could hear his voice telling me, as he usually does, to make the sky darker.  ha ha.  I do understand why in this case.
Then I headed up to Wells, Maine for a lecture on empathy at the The George Marshall Store Gallery.

Realizing Empathy: An Inquiry into the Meaning of Making
A presentation by Seung Chan Lim

 

Scraggly Sunflower

Scraggly Sunflower, 9x12", oil on 1 1/4" deep stretched canvas

Finished this last night, and it was a joy to paint.  The photo might be a tad yellower than it is in reality.  I tried and succeeded to keep the oranges.  So the color scheme is actually tertiary, orange, yellow, blue, green.  The background is abstract to help with the focal point. 

Still Scraggly

Scraggly Sunflower - not finished

This morning I worked on this sunflower painting again, I think it's the second day.  Why can't I remember?  Well, it was about a week ago that it got started and I've done other things in between.
I think it looks better in person, the camera makes so many adjustments to the values and the colors that it just doesn't look the same.

thoughts

Last night I went to an event, billed as a comedy show, in Harvard Square.  It was very thought provoking.  During my walk this morning, I thought.  Then while checking emails, etc., I came across this article and thoroughly enjoyed reading the comments to it.  I hope you have the time to explore it as well:  The New York Times, "Don't quit your day job."

Mad Monday

The Mary's Mondays (where I teach skating in the evening) was cancelled in favor of a private party so I got to go to Mark's Mondays (Mark Hayden's evening portrait group).  He posed, so this is the second attempt to paint him.  He's the one who says I'm afraid of the dark, and I think I did better with the darks here.

I wish I could find my first version of this portrait for comparison's sake.  It was a lot different and there were aspects of that one that I liked better.
 I also worked again (pretty much all day long) on the Red Lily painting where I'm trying to catch the glow of the sunlight on these flowers in my garden.  This is probably the forth day on this painting.

I'm trying to keep it lose but the main flower is such a challenge because of all the colors, thankfully, the background is easier to interpret in a lose way.  I'm finding that the supporting flowers are really beautiful as well and I'm managing to keep them in the background although they too are gorgeous in their own right.

Zorn, one of my favs

Zorn painting with 2-source lighting

I'm not sure if I posted this link before, but you can see the complete list of known paintings by Zorn on this link:  Zorn, 144 paintings

Today in Gurney 's blog, he talked about Zorn's 2-source lighting.  Link to Gurney's blog here:  Zorn's 2-source lighting