This past few weeks have been some of the worst for painting weather I’ve ever seen in Atlanta. Combined with a lot of work and family commitments I’ve done hardly any plein air. I did get out for a rather drab view of Mountain Park a few weeks back (below) but I had to wait till this Sunday before t
he gods gave me a bright, warm enough day to do some real work. After dropping my son off at the airport I decided to visit Oakland Cemetery just east of downtown and a landmark that has been on my “to paint list”. What a wonderful bright day it was—winter light just appears to have a different color to it. Although I did not walk the entire property it still took me about an hour to find the right spot. Contre-jour is French for into the
light and this made the tonal aspect of this painting more important than the color. I’m out of practice—I equate plein air to golf in a lot of ways. I think you’ve got to get out and hit some balls before going the first nine, I started on a small 9 x12 but took that off and used one of my 12 x 15s that have really felt better lately. I’m just too messy to get 9 x 12s working. The bigger size lets me calm down and fit in everything.
I was proud of my “set it down and leave it” approach on this. I’ve been painting without my glasses on too—It stops me from getting to finicky. After the 12 x15 I tried another 9 x 12 but this came out too messy in my eyes. I resisted touching it up though—for now. A week later I went back over for another shot and came up with the view at the very bottom. I thought it was pretty good but sometimes I’m not the best judge of it. I did do some touch-ups on this and pushed it into the studio rehlm a bit. I call it —Suburbs of the dead.
