Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Pleinly speaking

Fertile Fields. Outside Edinburg, Va. Oil on stretched canvas, 12x36
please contact me for price and shipping/delivery info

As I was driving away from Edinburg, Va., and the beautiful Shenandoah Valley, I saw - across the Interstate - a farmer driving a tractor over a field of rippling hills. After a series of wrong turns, I found the field, and set up to paint.

The farmer had gone away for a while, but in time, he came back and drove his tractor out of my painting. A fellow farmer, who later returned on another tractor, drove by and asked if it wasn't too hot for me to be painting. (At the time, about 8:30 in the morning, it was 86 degrees, and was headed to a forecasted 102).

No, I said. We are tough, we plein-air painters.

And, you know, we are. Tough or nuts. Sometimes the difference is only minimal.

This trip, I painted in snow and in blowing, gusting dust. I painted in tremendous heat and finger-numbing cold. I painted in gales, in sunshine, in rain showers. This trip, the bugs were the least of my problems, and for that, I was thankful. So a little bit of heat? I'm tougher than that.

I'm going to bring this computer in to be checked and cleaned, so I will probably be off line for a few days. Don't worry, though. I'll be back soon, with more paintings from the road and new paintings from home.

Thank you for reading.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

I like how you include your interactions with people while your painting. I like this one for the sweeping path across the canvas.