New Series, New Paintings

 I have been working with a new series of large paintings that are somewhat of a departure for me.

Afternoon Light, Mountain Series

 I have been enjoying the process of painting, experimenting with this subject matter. Afternoon Light is 20 x 30, a unique size that I found at a local canvas manufacturing company, not something they  normally have on hand.  I'm thinking that I might have to do some research to find a better source or else go back to stretching my own canvases. 

Eye of the Sleeping Man, Mountain Series

This painting reminds me of a lot of the geological features here, some caldera effects that you don't really notice until winter when the snow highlights the curve and the rocks. This one is 22 by 28. I remember going up to see Mt. St. Helens after the eruption and maybe there was some residual visual memory going on when I was working on this painting.  You can see more paintings on my website here.  

I think I'd forgotten how free it is to paint on a large surface.  I recently bought a new easel which makes it so much easier to handle large canvases, and I have a stack of really good sizes, just working my way up into the larger format to see what problems might arise.  You can't just blow up a small study into something that is 30 x 40 and expect it to work out visually. 

The gallery that was going to host my show in July-August unexpectedly closed at the beginning of April.  I know it was a hard decision for them, and after the shock I realized that I didn't have to keep working on the paintings that were going there. They were all small so maybe this new series is therapeutic and perhaps opening a new path of discovery. 

In the last two years I have recognized that I'm working more into the series orientation, which is actually good, structurally, for me.  A single idea keeps me focused and so far I have more ideas than time to paint them.  With this series I want to explore the various colors and light combinations, and also a bit of the unusual perspective, more like a hawk-eye view of the mountaintops.