One of the biggest issues I have in outdoor painting is knowing when to stop messing with the piece. To know when to stop and let it be. Overworking a piece is death to the painting. Plein air painting is fresh, confident not full of unneccesary detail. One thing that helps prevent overworking is COLD snow and ice that forms on your legs while standing thigh deep in snow. That really forces you to think, and just put it down. This pieces was quickly completed in a couple of hours (just as I could not feel my toes) at Hyde Park , 10 miles north of Santa Fe in March. The stream was flowing downhill, part of it under the snow, with clear ice forming over the top. Dry grasses poked through the surface and there were alot of little and not so little paw prints on the snow. Once I got just tooo cold, it was time to quit. It works, I was very happy with this, it definitely looks just how I felt. I guess I really am a desert girl.
One of the biggest issues I have in outdoor painting is knowing when to stop messing with the piece. To know when to stop and let it be. Overworking a piece is death to the painting. Plein air painting is fresh, confident not full of unneccesary detail. One thing that helps prevent overworking is COLD snow and ice that forms on your legs while standing thigh deep in snow. That really forces you to think, and just put it down. This pieces was quickly completed in a couple of hours (just as I could not feel my toes) at Hyde Park , 10 miles north of Santa Fe in March. The stream was flowing downhill, part of it under the snow, with clear ice forming over the top. Dry grasses poked through the surface and there were alot of little and not so little paw prints on the snow. Once I got just tooo cold, it was time to quit. It works, I was very happy with this, it definitely looks just how I felt. I guess I really am a desert girl.
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