DJ Geribo

I just had the pleasure of attending a David Curtis plein aire 3-day workshop that the Governor Wentworth Art Council offered its members for a nicely reduced rate. The workshop was held at the Todaro center but the intention was to head outdoors to paint. Unfortunately it was one of the few rainy weeks we’ve experienced in the last four months.

The first day we spent under the cover of the Todaro center porches. The second day was beautiful and we set up outdoors at the beach at the end of the road at the Todaro center’s YMCA camp in Moultonboro, along the shores of Lake Winnipesaukee.  The third day was again pouring rain so we stayed indoors either working on changes from the critiques we had on our paintings or on a couple of projects that David brought just in case we had an indoor day.

These were my first two paintings. My subjects were seen from the front porch at the Todaro center. The foliage in NH was just starting to change so I used artistic license and added a little more red and yellows to the trees. In the top painting, there was a little shed and that became my focus. David suggested that I add a hilly area to make the landscape look a bit more interesting. There was a white fence that ran the length of the field but it looked far more interesting cutting it off part way across the painting. He also suggested I lighten up the green in the far right corner, which I did. 


On the second painting, I added a rock wall on the left (there was part of that white fence, which I decided to leave out). I just could not get the right colors for the path. When I went home I got a couple of other colors that were not on David’s list but they were colors I often use in my nature paintings, raw umber was one of these and on the 2^nd day I made some changes to the path, throwing in some grass along the edges, and I made it look more like a walking path than a dirt road for cars to drive on.

I actually like both of these paintings now, better than the others I did which I am choosing not to share. But since they were painted on canvas panels with cardboard backing, they will remain practice paintings. I will date them and have them to look back on as I progress with my art.