Day 3, Confetti, Underpainting & Walnut Grove

I forgot to post this photo on my first day, and I felt it was important, so this is a little out of order.

Have you ever wondered how Albert Handell's pochade box is arranged? We waited with baited breath to see what he'd unveil and to our amazement, it was all arranged like confetti! I thought there would be a method to it all, neat as a pickle, but to Albert's defense he says when it's chaos, he doesn't get bored...and it is more interesting to just seek and find the right color/value. Very interesting, and surprising!

OK, now on to the day's work...

Today, Albert demonstrated his watercolor under painting method and told us we could do either watercolor or use pastel and wash with alcohol effectively while out in the field.

He began with a drawing in pencil on UART paper. He was thoughtful where he wanted the trees to go, taking great patience with their placement. He then implied darks, and with such intention he threaded the cast shadows of the branches.

Then he took Paynes Gray, Sap Green and a few other watercolors to create a very soft and wet underpainting. Again, his process took as long as the drawing. He then shared that the edges should be hard and soft from left to right, and top to bottom. Midway through his painting process, he said "feels good". Yeah, I'd like to say that too! Each phase of the painting took the same amount of time, 2 hours total.

Another beautiful piece!

We then went out to a magical Walnut Grove that had some really incredible trees and lighting. The shadows moved very fast because we were closer into the subject matter as opposed to a great expansive area.

Here is my pastel with alcohol underpainting. The alcohol dried so fast, that it didn't drip and wash over like fluid. Kinda blocky, but I didn't want to fuss with is so to get on with the party!

My resolve of the Walnut Grove.

Afterwards we met back at the studio for today's critique. In my piece, the lower portion is weak and the values in this area need to be darkened. Also, the sun spots need to be brighter and possibly more orange to show the filtered light dappled on the ground. The upper portion is "strong".

Tidbits from todays workshop:

Take your strong points and strengthen them.

Compare edges by top to bottom, left to right...one edge should be sharp, the other soft.

When in doubt (with an area of your painting), do nothing.

Use the negative space to shape trees with soft and hard edges.

When the sun comes through the trees, it goes through a prism and gets warmer. ( I gotta use this tidbit on today's painting!)

Simplify!

Tomorrow, will be a really long one, starting with a demo on trees, eat lunch, then each and every one of us are to bring in 6 pieces, (either from this workshop of from past work) and he will critique till 9:00. By this time the sun will be down, and then we will have a slide show of his work and a lecture. So I don't think I'll be in any shape to post tomorrow. :(