Easel Rest...Keeping Warm!

"Along the Southeast Corner Fence Line"

oil painting - © Bruce A. Morrison

(click on imagefor a larger view)

Finally finished my latest painting on the studio easel and am now working on starting the next, framing work for clients, trying to clean up this place and...oh ya, and keeping warm!

There's a lot of winter discontent out there, we all hear it, but I'm really kind of scratching my head.  I do remember winters like this AND worse.  I was younger then and trudged right through the sub zero temps and high winds...Iowa has always had high winds in the winter.  We never used to talk about wind chill either, or if there was an awareness of it I'm sure it was just the adults who talked about it.

But now the Weather Channel has "names" for winter weather fronts, and all the news anchors shout out the winter "ravages" like dooms day announcements...I still just scratch my head and think its so much unnecessary hype.  Its always been cold in the winter here, and besides - everyone else is getting lucky with all their snow and we've just barely scraped up enough to call the ground white now.  

The only bad thing I can think of here is without a good snow cover this winter - so much frost has gone into the ground that it has been a mess for wells freezing up and pipes bursting...that's never fun!   We're very dry in our area and with frozen ground, there's little that's going to replenish it come thaw, as the majority of moisture existing can only run off and not soak in until the frost is gone.

But I've been keeping warm in the studio with a spring painting, born from an idea last spring.  It was a pleasant morning on a new (for me) piece of prairie and woodland...always fun seeing a new landscape for the first time!  I took a photograph of this scene along the SE corner fence line of the property and almost imediately thought it spoke "painting" to me...I wasn't sure but it reinforced itself later as I viewed files here in the studio.  It had to wait for other work to be done here during the summer, fall and first half of the winter; but now its complete, still drying on the easel.

It needed few changes to move from the original file to the canvas...sometimes you find a scene that just really suits your feelings about what you want to paint and all the elements are there just as you'd like them to be.

Hope winter has been good to you!  And I do apologize to the SE part of the country for belittling this winter...they would certainly disagree with me! 

 

Enjoy'n It!

"From Waterman South"
(color pencil on hot press paper - 5 1/2X8")

Forgive my "slang" spelling but I'm really enjoy'n it! The weather...you know - spring! And the birds...woke up to one of the yard robins singing it's dawn chorus piece yesterday morning, haven't heard that since maybe last July!

The Great Blue Herons are returning to the rookery across Waterman Creek, and the Song Sparrows have returned and are serenading in the south pasture.

The "glaciers" are rapidly melting away in the yard and pastures...there's still a couple 18-36" deep, but virtually the entire driveway and neighboring areas are free! Now the bees from the hives south of the barn are out searching high and low for pollen...poor guys...it'll be a while before we can help out there.

I just finished another small piece that's actually been on my back burner for several years. It was out on the south section of the Waterman Prairie complex south of here...actually a few years before we bought this property we now call Prairie Hill Farm.

Georgie and I visited the south section of Waterman Prairie the year that the ground was purchased for the state. It was an area I revisited many times in the first few years and I photographed the landscape around it whenever the light was good. This was a view I really took to; at first I wasn't sure what it was about it, but I believe the light and the graphic qualities in the image were the "hook" for me.

I'll readily admit I do many pieces for reasons that are my "weakness" per se. I cannot shake emotional attachments. Once I fall in love with a place...for a moment, or for whatever reason...it becomes a part of my being. I wonder what exactly goes on but suffice it to say - I have to revisit it, even if it has changed. Revisit just to regain that feeling or emotion I felt at the time there. This piece is no exception.

If I had taken a photograph that met my expectations, I would have very likely stopped right there. But I did not. It was good enough to serve as a springboard for this small rendering, but I didn't feel it was enough to stand alone. I find sometimes I can recreate the memory in the way "I want to remember it"...I think it worked for me in that way, and I'm happy with it.

I prefer color pencils be small, larger pieces and attempts in the past have met with mixed results, they are also extremely time consuming. My first college art professor once told me that you should charge the same for a painting or other artwork that a plumber charges for their services (by the hour). Ha! I'll never forget that! But...the plumber could have redone the entire house during the time spent on this piece (and most other small color pencils I've done). Guess we just have to live with our limitations don't we???

But I'll treat this piece as a study, possibly...maybe someday down the road it'll morph into a new life as a larger painting? One never knows...

Break...

("Soo Landing in Early Spring" 6X8" plein air oil painting)

We've been getting some very cool damp days lately. Seemed to slow things down as far as the spring wildflowers and flowering trees. Our Wild Plums outside the studio have been swollen and waiting for a warm cue the past few days...now I think we have a break coming!

I decided to take advantage of this break in the scheme of things to get in some short painting practice. I feel very bad to let so much time pass in between paintings, but I need to take care of living issues like most everyone else. I have a couple big jobs taking all my efforts at the moment but decided I needed to be true to myself and scratch that itch today.

I drive by this location several times a year and on driving by last week, I thought this would be a nice location for plein air painting. The trees are still trying to shed the sheaths of their buds and some are just breaking into leaf...just starting to green up the river valley. This is the Little Sioux River a few miles south of here and what is called "Soo Landing". The river wasn't high like it should be this time of year but we're a little short on rain so far this spring.

The landing isn't in the best of shape but affords a nice river bend view to the northeast...you wouldn't even have to get out of your vehicle...which would be my preference come Black fly season! (This is a great river for them.)

Well...back to work I guess...nice to take a break though!