Plein air painting by BECKY JOY

Bye Mickey

Hi everyone, Its been a while since I posted. I was in my workshop all last week and then I had problems with my computer. Lost some photos, info, and email addresses. I had previously put most of my photos on CDs, but the latest paintings are not. So I will be photographing again.



The workshop with John Poon was great. Not a lot of new things, but it was presented very well. We talked about brushwork, color, value and composition, changing the landscape in plein air to support our focal point. This is one of the things I need to pursue more vigorously. I make small changes when I'm painting, but I need to take it a step farther and change things a little more to make a more dynamic composition. Use my imagination a little more and use the brushwork to help lead the eye through the painting.



This is one of the paintings from the class, a 8x6. This was painted on the Salt River. Most of the paintings were painted above looking down on the river and the rock cliffs. I've painted that scene many times, so I walked down to the river and painted this one and another. I loosened up on the brushwork and used the rocks in the shadows to lead the viewer back into the painting. John said he was waiting all week for me to start using my brushwork a little more.



The last few days I have been making small value sketches trying to unify more work more and to make more dynamic compositions. In the workshop after discussing things all week, John put up some photos from the locations that we painted at. We discussed what we would use as a focal point and what we would do to change the photo to support the point of interest. I thought that this was very effective in dealing with what we had learned.



Anyway, this painting will be for sale on eBay for $100. I do need to paint out one of the signatures. I noticed I signed it twice. I'll redo this and post it tomorrow along with another painting.



I also wanted to post the photo of Mickey. I didn't find a home for him, but I am going to say goodbye to him. I figured I really never looked at him for the last 40 to 50 years. He was just packed away in a bag. My kids and grandkids really aren't interested in him. As my granddaughter said, "He's scarry!"