Tony Conner

A quick browse through my galleries will make it obvious that light on trees, especially on the trunks of the trees, is a favorite theme and subject.Many times, my studio paintings begin with an older sketch, developed through a series of thumbnails, often followed by a color study or two.   This latest work began quickly from an old thumbnail sketch. The thumbnail indicated a deep forest and meandering creek, with bright sunlight streaming in from the left of the picture plane.

Rather than working out the composition with thumbnails and studies, I decided to jump right in.  I sketched out the composition on a half sheet of stretched watercolor paper and worked with a wet-in-wet background.

“Glow Woods”

13″h x 20″w

Unframed

$520

The initial underpainting was developed with layers of paint applied directly in successive layers.  One of the greatest challenges of working in watercolor is in creating rich darks without creating “mud” or muddy passages.  In this work, the deep foreground darks were developed by layering glazes over the background and over each other, but only after each successive glaze had completely dried - becoming “bone” dry, as I often tell my students.

The resulting painting worked well enough.  The contrast of the highly reflective stream with the dark shadowed forest along with the tree trunks that seem to glow with inner light create a bit of a fantasy look to these summer woods.

 “Along The Way”

9″ x 13″

Unframed

$235

It’s been almost two months to the day since the last post!?   Summer is a busy season for me with exhibits, shows and fairs.  The unfortunate reality is that actual painting time tends to get squeezed.  I have been more productive lately,  with a number of works in progress and a few completed.

As is the case for me quite often, this work began as a search through old sketchbooks for ideas and inspirations.  In this case, a very old sketchbook contained a color sketch completed in the little town of East Arlington, Vermont in 1994.

 East Arlington Vermont - Sept 7, 1994

The sketch is painted as if it was peak foliage, but it couldn’t have been that early in September.   Anyone who has looked at other posts on this blog knows my attraction to raking light and sunlit structures.  Looking at this one again inspired me create a similar feel but in the summer season.

My first thumbnail sketch was an attempt to keep both the feel and the scene as it was depicted in the original sketch.

After completing the first thumbnail, I decided to try another with the structures moved to the top of the composition and to give up the attempt to keep them as they were in the original sketch (and still are in East Arlington!).

This was the thumbnail that I decided to go with - with a couple changes.  In the final painting, farm buildings were switched with each other - the main building ended up to the right and the “el” building to the left. In addition, the both were pushed a bit farther into the distance and another building was added to the left to create more distance in the final work.