plein air

August 14, 2014 I went plein air painting for the third time with the South West Ohio Plein Air Painters (SWOPA), this time it was in a cute little town in Ohio Obyronville. There were lots of cute shops, and this was something different to paint since it was buildings. Normally I wouldn’t opt to paint a store or building, but I thought it would be fun and something different. Since I have many paintings of portraits, I figure it was time to focus on painting a different subject matter.

After meandering around a bit, I finally settled down in front of a place, I’m not sure if it was a restaurant or store. I plopped down, set up, and started painting!

As I sat down painting for 2 hours, a lot of people passing by were curious to see what I was painting and I got lots of compliments. In the past while plein air painting, I have been surrounded by other artists, however this time the SWOPA painters were spread out, as well as being outside in the public walking area, so there were lots of people observing.

I brought Gumby along to be my buddy on my easel 🙂 While I brought my french easel, turpentine, and plenty of brushes, I only had red, white, black, and purple! I completely forgot to pack yellow and blue! So I was limited to what I could paint for those 2 hours, so I decided to focus on the bricks and fence in the composition. I was able get quite a bit done surprisingly! I focused so much on the fence and making the lines perfect. After 2 hours in the hot sun, my mom and I decided to pack up and we got lunch!

We had lunch at The Bon Bonnerie Cafe, which I highly recommend! They are famous for their cakes, but their lunch was quite delicious! And the atmosphere is wonderful. I loved the fun decor in the cafe. I will definitely be going back there.

We got some cupcakes to go, here is my treat, a salted caramel cupcake! It was so yummy!

Later before going to bed, I added some detail to the painting (being in my room/personal studio, I had more colors at my disposal!) I’m pretty pleased with this painting, I hung it up on an empty wall space in my room. Normally, I don’t use turpentine and I apply paint very thickly, but because it was plein air painting, I wanted it to be a little more thin application. With the flowers I did thicken the paint application however. I like the mixture of texture and thickness.

I intend to paint outdoors more often, it’s very fun!

Today I went Plein Air painting with my Mother, Mary Beth Thompson Dowlin and the Brush and Pallet Painters. It was the first time in a long while that I’ve painted something from life, and not a photograph. I LOVE painting outside, it’s a great way to enjoy sunshine and practice painting landscapes. We all painted at my Aunt Nancy’s farm, which is one of my favorite spots in Ohio. There are so many pretty spots to paint, it was difficult making a decision this morning! I finally decided on a pair of beautiful apple trees. I really like painting trees, but need more practice. I went for an impressionism style with thick paint application, inspired by Monet and Van Gogh, two of my favorites.

Here is today’s product :

Next time, I will have to be more prepared! I left behind some materials, and it was quite windy. I look forward to painting Au Plein Air more often this summer!