Sand Beach Shadow Scape

Nub with Beach Boulders

Brooklin Boat Yard

Old Place Rd. Nub with Approaching Cloud

It's been a busy summer and fall of art making, not so much with the newsletter.

I just filled out a survey asking how the Museum School of Fine Arts in Boston, where I attended for a year, influenced me over time and how it influences me currently.

My realization is that the time I spent there and in various art school environments was rich and rewarding and paid off in unusual ways throughout my experience. The art school experience was a time of exuberant enthusiasm, and passion given an outlet. I enjoyed, no loved, exploring materials and making things and being exposed to art from the ages. It's the participation that counted. I have striven to be better, or more expressive, or simple, or honest, or direct, or complex, or like other artists from history but the engagement that happens when making, creating, and problem solving is a thing that is constant and gives satisfaction. I might go into it bored, confused about art, confused about life, frustrated, depressed, worried about money, or reputation, or any number of things, but when I show up ready to work something always happens. Sometimes it just takes practice to get the juices working or to work through repeated mistakes, but there is always a step of progress in the process.

I was pretty clueless in school how to do well financially in the art world and I am not much better at it now, but the sense of satisfaction and fulfillment that came and still comes with the art making was and is very powerful. I have been obliged to work in many other career paths to make a living over the years. I did not receive good training for business in art school, but I did practice things that mattered a great deal in the success of any pursuit, creative problem solving and persistent effort. I spent many years in construction where I practiced making things and solving problems. I used that proclivity to build my own house for instance. It's an art work of its own. Later I worked in small scale real estate investment. Trends had to be observed, things figured out, problems solved. When the activity wasn't visually oriented enough for me, I would take short breaks and spend time observing nature, sailing, photographing, or digging in the garden. So art school didn't make me rich, but it woke in me a passion for life that has lasted to the present, so I don't regret it, wish I had taken a more lucrative route. No, the satisfaction comes in the experience. It doesn't cost any more to be intensely curious, or dedicated to practice, or joyful in observation.

I live in coastal Maine and like many other people and artists here I love the seashore and the lighting show we call weather. The paintings above are all about observing, enjoying the moment, praising the beauty (possibly not allowed in the real art world), and at the same time they are about playing with the materials of watercolor. It is wet, it runs, it blends, it is transparent, it dries in different ways and different rates and pushes the paint around. It can be suggestive with a few strokes and rough gestures. It's fun and challenging at the same time.

As modern people we are so used to visual images that it doesn't take much description to communicate an idea. We get it. Usually the challenge in painting is to describe less and let the simplicity carry the day. Over description is death to the painting. I am still learning this lesson.

One rule in watercolor is that you are better off to paint an area once boldly and let the paint flow such as in passages in 'Brooklin Boat Yard'. The magic of the flow captivates. I spent as much time selecting the subject, the point of view, and thinking about the approach, and mixing the paint as I did actually painting. While I did that the sky changed several times.

Another rule if you are using transparent layers is to keep the layers light and to use direct descriptive brush strokes to build up the effect like the ones in 'Sand Beach Shadows'. The technique requires a consistent approach of layers that might seem very abstract while doing it, but then describes quite well when completed.

Sometimes the description is made of a system of light (no paint), shadow (some paint), and cast shadow (dark paint). The simple description can work for fruit on a table or rocks on a beach like in the 'Nub with beach boulders'. By the time I got to the end of the painting the tide was up and the beach rocks were covered. I had to stick with the original idea.

The painting with 'approaching clouds' has a mixed use of the above techniques. Loose and wet in some places, crisp light layers in others. I try and sometimes need to be open to the moment and paint intuitively and spontaneously. This time I was perched on a bit of raised ledge, the tide came in and cold water surrounded me, my feet and ankles got wet, but I stuck with it and got my painting, it was summer after all. Maybe I should have called it 'Approaching Tide', but this isn't video and you can't see the tide moving so well in a painting. Should I switch to video?