Plein Air Painting Competition 2013 – Painting Out The Kinks for Career Painting #10

Hi Friends!

I signed up for the 2013 Plein Air Painting competition…see this link…and the painting portion has begun!  Can we just say I am sooooo rusty!  Friends, I haven’t broken out the paints since this time last year.  I am soooo bad!

It is not for the lack of WANTING to paint, I have wanted to do it, but ever since my excursions last year and not having the right equipment (my makeshift easel fell over on one trip, can we say disaster?) I haven’t made any attempt yet.

I spent some time researching and shopping at area stores looking for a field easel.  I ended up choosing one and spent the better part of this morning on the maiden voyage to work out the kinks and see what I could come up with.

I spent the morning on the grounds of the Prairie Center For The Arts.  I spotted this view when I drove in and walked around the park until I found just the right spot.  The sky was overcast and there was some precipitation.  Not the best for painting but I knew I needed to do this.

Here’s my new set-up!  It’s just a field easel with my stay wet palette attached with binder clips.  It worked pretty good.

The lake is occupied by these Swans.  They are domesticated and taken care of by the Park District but non-the-less, when a swan comes near me I back away…far!

The photos probably do not do these birds justice but these birds are HUGE!  I mean, their webbed feet are about the size of a softball!  The whole bird is about the size of a Golden Retriever!  Big.

I did not complete the painting during my time out at the park, plus there were NO shadows whatsoever because of the overcast skies.  These pictures actually look pretty good (typical for a photo to come out better due to the filtered light) but live, it was hard to find any contrast in the colors!  My painting was turning into one big gray mess!!!

So, not wanting to spend too much time on a gray piece of mess, I mostly just blocked in a layout.  I’ll need to find another opportunity later in the week to go out again to finish it.  We have until May 10th to finish the painting!

Stay tuned!

Hope you all are having a nice Spring weekend!

~Cathy

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• Plein Air Painting in the Botanical Gardens, Good Friday (davidtripp.wordpress.com)
• Why Artists Should Try Painting En Plein Air At Least Once (longdensarronart.wordpress.com)