Looking Good in Green

I've never been the stereotypic female that screams at the sight of rodents or creatures with six or eight legs.  I've been known to actually take a spider out of the house and release him to live a better life in the great outdoors.  I recall once amidst the screams of my co-workers I was asked to crawl under the desk to check the recently sprung mouse trap only to find the poor creature alive and only trapped by a small portion of the leg.  I dawned gloves and took the trap and all in my car to the desert to release the terrified mouse.

There have only been a few times that I have locked my keys in the car and one of those times involved seeing a large praying mantis on a bush as I drove into a parking spot at the Costco.  I was so excited to examine the insect closer that I temporarily lost all sense and closed my car door with my keys lying in the seat.

It is no wonder that when I saw a photo by photographer Nina Schultz of Bisbee, Arizona of a gorgeous praying mantis atop a bush of massive white blooms I just knew this would be a painting I would like to try.

Here you can see my work in progress....still needing to add the final highlights.  When it's finished a high resolution photo will be taken and he will be available on my website at www.julietownsendstudio.com.  

There is a BUG Stuck in My Paint

I have been reading a book by Kevin Macpherson called "Fill Your Oil Paintings with Light and Color".  Mr. Macpherson is an accomplished En Plein Air painter.  (That is French for "In the Open Air")  This is an excellent book and I'm learning a lot about color, light and shadows from it's pages.

From someone who is a "Studio" artist, painting outside has a unique set of challenges as I experienced yesterday.  This style of painting is definitely something I want to learn and so I was very excited when my friend Lily asked me to accompany her along with few other artists with the Nevada Plein Air Group to Hemmenway Harbor at Lake Mead to spend a few hours painting in the fresh air.

I actually did learn a number of things and am anxious to improve my "En Plein Air" techniques.  The real truth is that yesterday I was basically pretending to paint and Lily is the real McCoy!  While she didn't finish her little 10 x 20 piece, she got a good portion of her painting completed and I was dually impressed. I spent a great deal of the time watching her ability to paint quickly so she could  catch the essence of the moment, not worrying about exact detail but rather reflection, light, color and shadows all come together so that she could catch the emotion rather than the exact image.

So different from painting on my beautiful new easel with all my supplies surrounding me and listening to either Willy Nelson or my new piano praise CD.  This will definitely take practice on my part but I'm anxious for the challenge of bugs stuck in wet paint, working in big floppy straw hats, dirt in my teeth and the sun in my eyes.