All right, I’ll give you a rundown on this event!

We arrived nice and early, around 8 AM. The location is only about 10 minutes from home so it was easy to do this. My location was in the 8600 block of Germantown Avenue, and I chose this spot at the intersection of Germantown and Bethlehem Pike. The day was warm, sunny, and quite windy.

I had decided to do 2 paintings, since I tend to work better if I move between pieces – I don’t overwork the details and consequently muddy things up.  I had two boards, 12″ x 16″, coated with a smooth gesso. Since I didn’t want to move my work area, I chose two views that I could see from my location.

So, I got to work.

Quite a few people were out visiting the event – there were 40 or so artists at work on the Avenue. (I’ll take this chance to say thank you to my friends John N. and David W. for stopping by!) Here is a look at the progress on Painting #1:

And here is Painting #2:

And here is where I finished with them. For the day, anyway.

I had some extra time and I had brought a larger board with me, so I started on it, using a view looking up the street. I was tired and losing focus, so I left this painting in a much more unfinished state (and it’s already had some changes made, believe me, one day later!).

At three o’clock, my husband and I took one of the paintings, the crosswalk one, to be displayed at the reception.

And that was the event!

I came away from it with some insights about how I like to work that I had not focused on before. Honestly, I don’t like painting in this manner – I mean in an official plein air event. I felt under pressure to stay with a depiction of what I saw in front of me, and no more – my painting was totally dictated by what I saw outside myself, rather than from what comes to me inside my own head. I realized that even when I paint from a photo, I feel free to make changes, to use it only to spark other ideas, and most of all, to access memories or feelings inside me. Here – I didn’t feel much connection to what I was painting and so I don’t like what my results were. Which is why I say the paintings were finished – for that day! But not finished, the way I feel something is finished.

I did enjoy being outside and working, though I would make sure to be in the shade, and on a less windy day – the paint dried as quickly as I stroked it on the surface. I struggled a bit with my materials, I guess I’m saying.

So what I need to be doing is, working outside but painting from the inside – of my own head. And if I can combine the actual world with the internal one, I’ll have a happier result, both in my feeling about my work and the actual paintings themselves.

This insight is nothing cosmic, but it did help me put things into perspective. I now have three paintings started off and where they will go from here – we will see!

You may remember this event, scheduled for last Sunday but canceled due to the rainy weather, is taking place tomorrow. And the weather is looking great.

We’ll be painting along Germantown Avenue in the Chestnut Hill section of Philadelphia from about 8 AM to 3 PM. I’m in the 8600 block, right at the top of the hill.

I don’t paint out in the open air too often. So I’ll be interested to see what I come up with!

The second half of next weekend, Sunday, June 5, I’ll be participating in a plein air event just a few minutes from home – in the Chestnut Hill section of Philadelphia.

I did this event last summer – you can read about it here. And I’ll let you in on something – though I said the painting was finished after the event – a few days later I took it out and did some more to it. It looked pretty similar, and yet – not! So that goes to show you that everything is subject to revision. Here’s the finished painting, and if you like, you can compare it to what I did on the plein air day.

 

 

Anyway, I had a great time, and I’m glad to be going back. I have a different location to paint this year – I’m at the top of the hill on Germantown Avenue, the 8600 block (last year I was in the 8300 block).  If you are around, stop and say hello. I’ll be there (unless it rains, in which case there is a rain date of the next Sunday, June 12) from about 8 am to early afternoon.