A Light in the Storm

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C1610

“A Light in the Storm”

(Destruction Island Light … Washington Coast)

Oil on Centurian Oil Primed Linen Panel

12" x 24"

Detail of “A Light in the Storm”

C1615

“End of a Perfect Forest Day”

(Cascade Range)

Oil on Raymar Canvas Panel

12” x 9”

C1616

“Quiet Evening on Second Beach”

(La Push, Washington Coast)

Oil on Raymar Canvas Panel

8” x 16”

I know, I know … it’s been over four months since I last posted.  Well … I’ve been busy … so there. 

Picture petulant lower lip stuck out about half a mile.

Actually, I have been busy … as I write I am perched next to a window overlooking the fields above Trevalga, North Cornwall, England.  It is towards midnight and I am in friends’ holiday cottage and the stars are glimmering down over the fields as I look north past Boscastle (where I lived for seven years), and beyond towards the lights of Bude, and on to the radar domes of Morwenstow twenty miles distant; there is even a more distant light twinkling farther up the coast towards Hartland Quay… it may even be Hartland Quay.  It is a special landscape even beneath the silent stars.  I am listening to Sibelius’ Symphonies Numbers 5 & 6, and wondering what this New Year will bring into this more nasty, more prejudiced world many of us thought had been left behind decades ago.

Be that as it may, once I returned to base after the Coos Art Museum Maritime Exhibition in July, I set to work on several paintings for delivery to my Galleries before I headed out from Oregon, on this journey which brought me to this window overlooking these familiar fields from my long ago.  The painting which appeared in my last posting (here) was the first and is now to be found in the Second Street Gallery, Bandon, Oregon.  The three shown above are to be found at the Kirsten Gallery in Seattle (details below).

The research for C1610 - “A Light in the Storm,” and C1616 - “Quiet Evening on Second Beach,” was done in 2009, when I spent several days in the coastal section of the Olympic National Park, Washington State.  Second Beach was about a half hour stroll from the road through beautiful the beautiful temperate rain forest, and once onto the beach, the whole day was easily spent walking along the length of the beach, drawing, and painting and taking reconnaissance photos for future work, and C1616 is one of the results. 

Destruction Island, on the other hand, is further down the Washington Coast and sadly the light was permanently turned off in 2008.  It lies 3½ miles offshore, and once I saw this Island from the shores of Ruby Beach, I knew I had to paint a dramatic seascape.  Although it has taken longer than expected to do so, it has now been completed, and even more dramatic than I first envisioned.   

C1615 - “End of a Perfect Forest Day,” was inspired by just that … the end of a wonderful day at my campsite up in the coast range above Coos Bay, a few days after the opening of the Maritime Show last July; and a productive and most enjoyable day.  I completed the small painting I was working on, prepared and ate my supper, and was sitting watching the changing light in the valley below, and the just-past-quarter Moon in the sky above.  As the Sun sank into the Northwest, and its light on the trunks of the Douglas Firs began to glow an Earth Orange Hue, I watched as the Moon glided between the branches above.  It was a scene worth remembering, and so here it is and I share it with you. 

Next posting will tell a bit about my travels from Oregon to Minnesota and on to a class reunion in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, and of places from my long ago, and others new in that northern land.

The Second Street Gallery, 210 Second Street SE, Bandon, OR 97411

Phone:            541-347-4133                                    Email: BandonArtworks@gmail.com

The Kirsten Gallery, 5320 Roosevelt Way NE, Seattle WA 98105

Phone: 206-522-2011                        Email: r2thetop@hotmail.com

For those interested I give the following information.

C1610 - “A Light in the Storm” …

Imprimatura & Drawing/Block-in: Vasari Terra Rosa.

Pigments: Vasari Terra Rosa; Winsor & Newton Cobalt, Cerulean & Ultramarine Deep Blues, Permanent Rose, Cadmium Yellow Pale, Cadmium Orange, and Cremnitz White; M. Graham Hansa Yellow Pale (very little).

C1615 - “End of a Perfect Forest Day” …

Imprimatura: W&N Venetian Red.

Drawing: W&N Venetian Red & Ultramarine Deep.

Pigments: Vasari Terra Rosa; Winsor & Newton Cobalt, Cerulean & Ultramarine Deep Blues, Cadmium Yellow, Cadmium Orange, Venetian Red and Cremnitz White; Rublev Blue Ridge Yellow Ochre, Italian Burnt Sienna, Cyprus Raw Umber Deep, Cyprus Warm Burnt Umber.

 C1616 - “Quiet Evening on Second Beach” …

Imprimatura: None.

Drawing/Block-in: Vasari Terra Rosa and W&N French Ultramarine.

Pigments: Winsor & Newton Cobalt, Cerulean & Ultramarine Deep Blues, Cadmium Orange, Cadmium Yellow, Cadmium Yellow Pale, Permanent Rose, Venetian Red, Cremnitz & Titanium Whites; M. Graham Hansa Yellow Pale; Rublev Blue Ridge Yellow Ochre, Ceruse; Vasari Terra Rosa.

Grand Canyon Afternoon

C1502

“Afternoon Cloud Shadows”

(Grand Canyon, Arizona)

Oil Sketch on Ampersand Gesso Panel

3” x 4”

Click here to make this your Own

And after finishing yesterday’s Oil Sketch it was time for lunch, hastily wolfed it down and began on the next one, above.  By now the light was a bit mellower, as a little afternoon haze softened the distance.  There was more Sun as the clouds had thinned and become those cumulous of oft remembered lazy days; but no lazing for me.  The slowly moving cloud shadows drifting across the sub-canyons & buttes within the greater chasm itself now became the reason to paint.  The colours of the landscape became a bit brighter than in the morning’s work, partly I think because of the more apparent contrast of the soft greens of the vegetation (grasses, sage?), with the earth reds of the Canyon walls. 

Again I chose a 3" x 4" panel, since Morning & Afternoon makes a natural pair; no matter that they might go to separate homes ... it's the painting exercise that matters.  I proceeded as with the earlier painting, with a brush drawing in Cobalt Blue, and again no imprimatura; the pigments used were the same as the morning, being Cobalt Blue, Venetian Red, Yellow Ochre, Naples Yellow (hue), Cadmium Red, and Titanium White.  The lovely quiet greens, were mixed from the blue and both yellows and the white; I’m always surprised with the various greens one can get with these subdued yellows. 

There is something singular about the perception of space and distance in the West.  I first began to feel this when first crossing the Cascade Range in Oregon from the Willamette Valley to the High Desert, and I realized that I could see where I’d been two hours before and sixty miles off in the distance.  Again and again his happens when travelling out here.  On Thanksgiving Day in 2012, and the day after, while heading east from Oregon to Oklahoma, this would happen again and again with even greater distances.  Here on the edge of the Grand Canyon one looks down thousands of feet and miles across to the opposite rim and, and as you come to terms with the actuality of those distances you realize how long it might take you to walk those distances.  I can well understand those first Spanish explorers with Coronado, who upon looking down from the South Rim for the first time, thought that the “little brook” a few hundreds of feet below could be easily stepped across; or so they thought until members of their party actually climbed down and confronted the Colorado River itself; then they had to climb back up!