Across the Delaware

My painting of the Ben Franklin Bridge across the Delaware River. 10x 20, oil.


Yesterday the Dirty Palette Club had our second weekly meeting of the summer at a nice park along the Delaware River in Philly. This time it was just me and the gals as the other male members were busy or away. Lucky me!

It was a nice day, hot, but I found a great spot under a nice tree and got to relax the old mental muscle from the stress of the weekly commercial grind in my studio.

I picked up a few landscape proportioned panels at the last sale at Dick Blick and tried out one of them. I packed a pic-nic lunch and just enjoyed painting as the tide rolled out and the ships rolled past.

My feeling with plein air is to hunt for a scene fast, pick it, stick it and paint it as the sun gives you 3-4 hours.
Alina choosing her shot.

Here is my palette set-up and my pencil rough in of my painting.

Here is my painting after about roughly 30 minutes when things started to change like the tide going out.

Yesterday the lighting did change and it became a bit more overcast and that diffused the lighting a bit and probably gave us a longer time to paint, also I planned the suns change and figure what would change fast earlier in the paint and what would change later. I however hadn't taken into account that the tide would go out, which it did about half way into my painting. This ended up giving me a much more interesting foreground to my painting--and I leapt to get it down fast. The tide started coming back and then some big cargo ships moved through and their waked really changed everything--the driftwood logs and interesting details.
Lexi and I take a lunch break.
Alina and Lexi brunching under the trees.

The more I paint in nature I realize how much forethought and planning you need, how much you have to focus and think as everything is 'live". I also and concentrating on altering things for the sake of the painting more, eleminate a tree, change a shape of a rock, bush, etc.

It is always great to have company and to watch and see what everybody else is up to and how they solve their problems and interpret the same or similar scene. Alina and Lexi paint away.

Here is Alina and her painting, this was only her second time painting a plein air landscape.