Westlake Beach

Westlake Beach   5x10

Yesterday in Austin was one of those amazing late fall days with near perfect conditions for painting outdoors. The "made to order" day was also, appropriately, the end of year party for Plein Air Austin painters group. The turnout was great and it was really something to see the lakeside park and marina covered with fall color and dozens of artists all out painting ! What a fun group. I have really enjoyed being a part of this diverse and talented group of artists since joining at the beginning of the year. As is typical  on these plein air paintouts, it all went by too fast. Before I knew it, I had spent over an hour taking reference photographs, so I finally set  up to paint and focused on a fairly simple composition in the late afternoon sun. The watercolor study above is of a poplar tree near a wood trellis on the banks of the marina that  took about 45 minutes to complete.

Fall Leaves 11.30.10

Fall Leaves 11.30.10 One-Four   5x5
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This series of four miniature paintings are similar to ones I have painted before. I did many small paintings like this several years ago, only they were painted in gouache on paper with a gessoed surface. Here I wanted to try  it again in watercolor as an exercise in creating these textures. The gouache method tends to have more contrast within each color when applied, as it is more opaque than watercolor, so I needed to build up several layers of colors to establish a similar appearance. These leaves were collected yesterday with my daughter on our walk home from school. She especially liked several we found near a bradford pear tree.