February 9, 2014

Today's date is a special one.  The first, of the two greatest things to happen in my life, happened 30 years ago today... my oldest son was born!  I was thinking about that all day long with the weather here today.  When he was born, it was also VERY cold, but I was not out painting then! :)

All day today the air was full of a fog that was freezing on everything it touched, but was even more pronounced the closer to the edge of the foothills that I was.  It was a day for having to look very hard to see the subtle shifts in color temperature.  The spacial division from value shifts was very slight, mostly just big, fog induced non-descript shapes, against the lightest value of the snow.  Fun to paint, but nothing like yesterday's color world.  But, I love painting this kind of day.

My palette was full, but about all I put a brush in besides white, was ultramarine blue, terra rosa, yellow ochre, some viridian and alizarin, and the greenish umber.

The moisture was chilly however, there were several coffee breaks (toe warming sessions) before it was all over.

Thanks for looking in... Enjoy!

2-9-1 "Freezing Fog #1" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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2-9-2 "Freezing Fog #2" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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2-9-3 "Freezing Fog #3" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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2-9-4 "Freezing Fog #4" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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February 8, 2014

I'm liking this weather!  I started out the day by painting another 'long view', the Smoke Shack.  I realized that I was concentrating too much on what I love so much about this area, the patterned, textural quilt of the big landscape.  I drive around with my jaw in my lap constantly... this area is such a beautiful layout of rolling hills, dotted with old and new farms, all backdropped by the Front Range.  I am an addict.  

However, as much as I love it, I also like the smaller, more intimate angles on the landscape.  Seems I've been painting a lot of the wide angle views lately.  So after the first one of the day, I was looking around (all of these were painted on one road in a stretch of about a mile) and saw that there were paintings everywhere that I hadn't been looking at.  With the temps as mild as they were, I just planted myself and painted away.  I like when I don't have to do a road trip to find the paintings I want to paint.  

For the painters, one thing that is an issue when doing this all day for days in a row, is the toll the bright light takes on the eyes.  I've recommended against it, then realized that there are times when wearing sun glasses to paint, like in extreme bright situations near water or on snow, might be the way to go.  Using a very neutral colored lens, no pink shades please, I've found that the color and values are pretty accurate.  In the end, it's all relative, so if you need to paint with them on, leave them on all the way through of course, but it's not the worst thing a painter could do.

But... I didn't wear them today.  I hate wearing them to paint... :)

Not sure what tomorrow has in store, but if it's anything close to what today was like, I'm happy already.  

Thanks for looking in... Enjoy.  And thank you All for the comments.  It's been hard to get to them all with a reply, I hope to eventually gather all of them together and write up a blog post answering as many as I can.  

2-8-1 "Smoke Shack" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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2-8-2 "Roadside Darks" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

SOLD

2-8-3 "Frozen" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

SOLD

2-8-4 "Scraggly" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

SOLD

February 7, 2014

Nice day, but I only came home with a couple of paintings in the creel.  Since I set this goal for myself, I'll be making these up by painting more than my goal of 4 a day, during the next few days.

The day started a little late, I had a couple of errands to do ($7.99 haircuts at Great Clips).  Already late for my normal start, and on the way to my first spot for the day, I ended up spending about an hour or so helping a guy with a BMW Z4 Roadster get out of a ditch, that he ended up in while driving it on an icy, snow packed country road where there's a drop off of about a foot or two on each side.  Not a good place for a high powered rear wheel drive sports car.  He was resting on an axle, but we managed to dig him out enough so that with his wife at the wheel, he, a lady jogger who came by, and I were able to finally push him free.

When that was over, I was at the time of day when I normally would have already had two paintings finished.

I was secretly thinking... "Good, it's only going to be warmer, later!".  The things you'll do to try making a situation for yourself better, or seem better.   I painted the first one, wiped the second one (which you can't see), painted the third one, and wiped the fourth one... which is also absent by default!  That's how it goes some days... I'm looking forward to tomorrow.

More coyotes, in fact, it sounded like the entire country side was crawling with them at one point this afternoon.  Howling all over the hills and valleys around me.  Saw three of them patrolling a fence line on my way home.

Also, this project has now turned my Honda Odyssey into an official 'paint mobile'... unless I can clean the cadmium orange and red off of the upholstery on the driver's door.  I know I can remove all of the hand prints off the door handles, and the brush marks off of the windows, no big deal.  But this upholstery situation is troubling.

Enjoy...  I'm going to get a good meal! :)

2-7-1 "A Warmer Morning" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

SOLD

2-7-2 "Cooling Afternoon" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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February 6, 2014

It was a warmer start today... -9ºF.  The high today... a raging +4ºF!!!

After yesterday and spending the day in the van, I said... "Screw it... I may not get another chance this winter to paint in this frigid weather... I'm painting in the 'open air'!"  I am getting acclimated to these temps now.  But, I'm not an idiot, so I put on layers of extreme cold weather clothing.  Being an outdoor guy from Minnesota, I could cover every square cm of my skin, head to toe, with at least 4" of insulated garb if I needed to.  Today I wore my LaCrosse -120ºF boots, and was toasty warm.  I did stick a hand warmer under my outer sock in each foot.  I felt tropical all day long.

And an absolutely stunning day it was!  There was so much color, from sun up to sun down, that I wish I could paint about a dozen studies a day to try to grab some of it.

When I paint in these kind of temperatures, the oil in the paint gets stiff of course, just like the motor oil in your car engine.  There are a couple of things I do to make it possible to move the paint around at these temps.  First, I make use of a non oil medium, like Liquin, or a thin oil medium, like Winsor & Newton's 'Drying Linseed Oil'.  Both of these have a nice fluidity, even when it's this cold.  Secondly, I make liberal use of smallish sized palette knives.  I may apply most of the paint in the painting with a knife, scrape it back down, manipulate that with a brush... what ever works.  With those two methods, and using OMS as needed to thin the paint, it's really not a big deal.

I was lucky today, NO WIND.  If the wind were strong, my tune would be sounding different.  Tomorrow... +38º!!!  I can't wait, and am very glad I painted the special qualities of light and color, that the frigid atmosphere presents.

My coyote buddies were back around the hood again today.  One coyote a quarter mile out in the middle of a flat, snow covered field, looking small and wandering around, looking for a mouse most likely, is a lonely sight.  I also had a great experience today.  Not far from where I live, there are about 250 elk who've made their way out of the higher altitudes to lay in the sun and lounge all day in safety.  They're a little far off of the road, but it's an impressive sight.

Thanks for looking in...

2-6-1 "Nine Below" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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2-6-2 "Ridgeline" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

SOLD

2-6-3 "Oxford Rd Farm" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

SOLD

2-6-4 "39th St View" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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February 5, 2014

I woke up to -12ºF... with a wind chill of around -25ºF.  That's Minnesota weather!!!  After going around the horn about this with many friends, and numerous PM's to me about how I should be careful about freezing body parts, I decided to paint with acrylics today.  Since acrylics freeze, it meant that I would have to accept a day painting from my van.  Not because of the cold, of course, but because of the medium?  Ok... I admit to giving in to the day.  But that's the last one.  It's way too uncomfortable to spend a day painting inside a vehicle.  It's cramped, it's hard to find a place to park where there's something interesting to paint, that I can get a good view point to paint it from, and it's just not right! ;)

Truthfully, I tried it outside and after about 5 minutes, it got cold fast.  Good news for me is that on Friday it's going to hit 38º and by the following Friday, 48º!  Can't wait.

More coyotes out and about today.  They're so gorgeous this time of year, thick winter coats and the acuteness of an eagle while on patrol for a lunch morsel.  My admiration for these animals is growing daily.

2-5-1 "Cement Plant" - acrylic - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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2-5-2 "Flood" - acrylic - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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This painting is of what was a pasture, until last September's flood.  This area that you are looking at was about 5' underwater during it all.  Entire acreage's were eroded and wiped away.  I painted this area a number of times prior to the flood, this was a very peaceful, pastoral field.  Now it looks like a mini Grand Canyon.  

2-5-3 "Muted Compliments" - acrylic - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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2-5-4 "Sundown" - acrylic - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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February 4, 2014

Snow day!  Today was a good old fashioned cold winter day... the kind I left behind in Minnesota?  Not so it seems.  It's beautiful, and I actually like that I get to paint it.  But it has put the chill in my bones, that's for sure.  Knowing it was likely to be snowing all day today, before I went out on location this morning, I made a stop at Home Depot.  I had an idea that if I found the right ingredients, I could rig a shelter that used my raised tail gate as a support.  With about $35.00 in materials in hand, I rigged up a very useable wind/sun/snow break as you can see in the photos.

It was hard to keep the fingers warm, and that's with glove liners, Atlas Nitrile palmed gloves, and fingerless mittens on.  On top of that, the paint was mixing with the snow most of the day, creating a very weird, granular mix.  It was nearly impossible to stick a brush into the paint and get any on the brush.  So, I painted most of these paintings today with a palette knife or two.  It was simply the easiest way to get paint on the panel.  I found that I enjoyed using the knife.  Only occasionally did I use a brush on the last three of the day.  

I had planned to go back to the same locations that I painted yesterday, and paint them again today with the snow falling.  That didn't work, except for the first one of the day, because the distance was obliterated by the falling snow.  None of the foothills or mountains that painted yesterday, were in view today.  Instead, I wandered the back roads close to my home, where there is always something of interest to paint.  

I saw a bunch of beautiful coyotes today.  Such an amazing animal, hardy and always an opportunist.  

I hope you enjoy the limited palette of a snowy day...

2-4-1 "Rabbit Mtn Redux" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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2-4-2 "55th St Flurries" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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2-4-3 "Snow Day" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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2-4-4 "Frozen Road" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

SOLD

February 3, 2014

This morning was clear and cold!  Sunny, but it caught me by surprise.  I came about as close as I have in a long time, to freezing some toes and fingers.  When I started out, it was about +5ºF.  Fortunately as the day went on, it was a little bit warmer.  Word has it that the next few days are to be snowy and even colder...

I painted some local hills today because I could finally see them.  The first painting is of Rabbit Mountain Open Space, between Lyons and Longmont.  I've been told that it used to be called Rattle Snake Mountain, but it wasn't a good public image so the name was changed.

From there I went to a local 'wide' view spot, at the end of runway 29'er, where there is a large viewing parking lot for those of us who are airplane nuts.  Since there's no obstructions to the approach and landings, it provides a great view all the way west to the foothills.

Keeping in the same frame of thinking, I drove to Lagerman Reservoir, another Open Space area.  This also has a wonderful, unobstructed view all the way to the mountains.  Nice to be out there, so I painted the last two pieces for the day there.  The last one had a little bit of Rabbit Mountain in it again, hence the title.

On the way out I was pleasantly surprised to see 6 bald eagles on the ice.

Tomorrow should be interesting...

2-3-1 "Rabbit Mountain" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

SOLD

2-3-2 "Twin Sisters" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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2-3-3 "Lagerman View" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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2-3-4 "Rabbit Brush" - oil - 8x10

©Marc R. Hanson 2014

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