Morning Glade (and Terri Ford Demo!)

"Morning Glade"  (pastel, 12x12 inches)  click here to bid

OK! I've finally taken the Terri Ford workshop that's been on my calendar for months! A part of me wishes these last two weekends had been switched so that I could have learned from Terri before my own workshop in Rockdale. She had us do two different underpaintings, with pastel washed in with denatured alchohol. Saturday's painting was a 'notan', or monochromatic, underpainting, with a dark blue-green pastel. Sunday's painting was using various colors in the underpainting (see tomorrow's post!)

Today's post shows my painting from Saturday, with the monochromatic underpainting (see below)

You see the cup of alcohol, the Nupastel 305 (Spruce Blue) that Terri highly recommends for underpainting, an old bristle brush, and paper towel for making sure you keep just the right amount of alcohol on your brush when washing in the pastel.

Below is the much more impressive Terri Ford demo from Saturday, of some trees with light on them:

 This was as far as Terri got on Saturday...

...but she had worked on it a bit more by Sunday (see here), and was adding a few more strokes after the workshop ended (I didn't get a shot) because lucky Jan Weaver had bought it!

Stay tuned for tomorrow's post, and the full color underpainting!

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Creek Bend

"Creek Bend" (pastel over watercolor, 12x9 inches)  click here to bid

My last painting from my weekend workshop in Rockdale, Texas was from the old 1912 iron bridge. We spent Sunday along the San Gabriel River at Apache Pass (see yesterday's post for details!) We had an incredible breakfast and lunch catered by Kit and Linda Worley, owners of the soon-to-be-open Apache Pass Steakhouse. It was the only time I can remember being distracted from the views by the food long enough to not care how quickly the sun was moving across the sky!

 The older ladies stayed inside in the afternoon, but D.K. was nice enough to hang out while I was doing my underpainting and took some shots.

 I really put a lot into this underpainting...

 While working on the pastel, D.K. started her own painting of the view. But Mary Claire came by and took some shots when I was done. I love how she lined up the painting with the reality!

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Still Pond

"Still Pond" (pastel over watercolor, 6x8 inches)  click here to bid

Sunday we had a fabulous day en plein aire at the Apache Pass, which aside from being the location of a great new restaurant (almost open) and Icehouse (already open), includes acres of land along the San Gabriel River and the El Camino Real National Historical Trail.

This is a quick view of the river just yards down from the actual Apache Pass, the gravel bar crossing on the river that was used for centuries by Native American Indians, then by explorers and settlers, and now by local ranchers and farmers. The crossing was supplemented by an iron bridge built in 1912, which exists right above my scene, but using artistic license I decided to leave it out of this small painting. The river is quite low right now, which allowed us to stand virtually in what would normally be the riverbed.

Tomorrow I'll post my last painting from the weekend, a view farther downriver which I did from standing on the old bridge.

Here's the "Still Pond" progress:
 

 I was moving right along with the underpainting before I remembered to have someone take some shots...

 

 The pastel was quite minimal on this one... just enough to get the feel for the scene:

 See the old iron bridge? I painted from that vantage after lunch!

And here's my lovely group of ladies! What a fun-filled weekend we had!

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Old Barn

"Old Barn" (pastel over oil wash, 9x12 inches)  click here to bid

Here's Saturday's second demo from the workshop in Rockdale, TX. I created the two underpaintings in the morning, then demoed "Beach Path" (yesterday's post) right after lunch. This one I worked on in between helping the ladies with their pastel work.

Below are some progression shots of the underpainting, and one partway through the pastel:

the finished underpainting

 Partway through the pastel, I didn't like the foreground grasses, which had gotten too busy. So I washed a large area out with mineral spirits and a brush. I didn't add very much more pastel before calling this finished.

I really love Rockdale as a workshop town. They're all about hospitality!
Tomorrow I'll post about Sunday's plein aire adventure at Apache Pass.

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Beach Path #2

"Beach Path #2"  (pastel over watercolor, 8x10 inches)  click here to bid 

After a 2-day delay, I've finally found the time to sift through my workshop photos from the weekend and create some posts! Here's my first demo from Saturday, our 'indoor' day working from photos. I think this scene was from the San Diego coast at Torrey Pines State Park.

Below are some photos of the underpainting and the pastel progression:

Thanks for watching! Please share!

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