Winter Painting Commission - The Process

The light and warmth of late summer accompanied me through the dark days of winter in the form of a 36 x 60 inch canvas, a commissioned painting of the view of a neighbor’s shore. As is often my practice, I tinted the canvas before laying in the composition, providing an immediate blast of heated color that needed to be subdued. 

I had thought about the space and composition a lot before beginning, so getting started and blocking in the image happened quickly. However, the process of wiping out and reapplying paint soon became the daily routine as I struggled to balance and unify this painting with its long rectangular shape – an unusual format for my work.

Each day that I work on a painting, I try to achieve a quality of unity within it, to integrate another layer of complexity throughout the entire work. I felt that the apple tree upset this unity, and modified the right corner to achieve a better balance.

During the months of January and February while eighty-four inches of snow fell and sub zero temperatures prevailed, I felt fortunate to have this cocoon of summer at the studio. I worked on other paintings, but this project dominated my time. Some of my paintings are like sketches in their immediacy, but this one, although gestural in its approach, developed gradually, acquired many layers of paint, and kept the process challenging. 

Wahoa Bay Evening, 36x60, oil on linen, 2015