Feb 3, 2012 - Silk Road Covered Bridge Bennington, Vermont

Silk Road Covered Bridge,  Bennington, VT.   Like most winter days in VT, it was “cloudy with breaks of sun” as the forecasters like to say.  When I sat down to paint, there was sun light hitting the left – south – side of the bridge and some of it was passing through the lattice structure and landing on the white door casing on the interior right. By the time the drawing was done, the sun was pretty much gone.  I left the sun & shadow pattern on the inside of the doorway never-the-less.   The finished sketch is about “9 x 12″ and done in a D’Arches 140lb CP watercolor paint book.

Winter colors dominate this sketch, just like they do in the previous two – Feb 1 & Feb 2, 2012.   It is a challenge to create enough variety in the grays and other low intensity earth colors to keep shapes from merging with one another too much.    The grays in this sketch are mixed from either ultramarine or cobalt blue with burnt sienna, raw sienna or Quinacridone burnt scarlet.  Using these five pigments in varying combinations creates a nice variety of color and value which gives the sketch the look of winter without being too somber.

This can’t really be described as a “wet-into-wet” watercolor painting, and yet the technique is used in a number of places – especially in creating the look of distant forest without much fuss.   Beyond the distant trees in the background, it is also used on the foreground right roadway, the sky and in laying in the initial rusty, violety (if there is such a word) red on the covered bridge itself.

If there truly are trends that take hold, become popular and then eventually give way in watercolor, I would have to say that ultra, macro realism is the current look and technique for watercolor painting.  All the big national and regional watercolor exhibits seem to have more every year.  Sometime that doesn’t leave much room for those of us still painting in “older”, less trendy styles and techniques.  I tend not be a follower, so will continue working in the style and with the techniques that produce what I like to describe as “representational impressionism” seen in most of my work.

In the classes that I teach, I have noticed my students having two very different reactions to the wet-into-wet watercolor technique.  They love the look it produces, but seem to feel nothing but frustration when trying it themselves.    By popular request and in response to both of these reactions,  I have put together a new class called Wet-in-Wet Watercolor and will be offering it for the first time in just a couple of weeks.  The class will teach the basics of the technique along with several skills needed to handle wet-into-wet watercolor without, or at least with less, frustration.  Not only will the class teach the skills but is guaranteed to loosen up the work of anyone using them.   More info on the Wet-in-Wet Watercolor class can be found by clicking here.

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With the cloud cover, it was impossible to find a nice light effect, but some orange glow in the sky at sunset made for a nice quick “skyscape” sketch.  When I say quick, I mean it.  The sky wash was laid in with blue gray for the clouds and mixture of cad orange and cad red dropped in at the horizon.  As the sky dried, I went in quickly with a thick was of mostly cobalt blue for the more distant mountainside.  The nearer mountain is a mixture of cobalt blue, Daniel Smith’s Quinacridone Burnt Scarlet and some raw sienna added quickly and thickly over the wet sky wash.  Although there is virtually no snow on the ground in reality, I created a very simple forground with a dark stream running through a partially snow covered landscape.

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Feb 1, 2012 - Near Sunderland VT

I always encourage students in my classes to liberally buy and use sketchbooks to develop their skills.  Yet since, last fall when both art and non-art related things started taking up my time, I’ve been ignoring my own sketchbooks.
Beginning yesterday, Feb 1, I have a new commitment to liberally buy and use sketchbooks – actually, I won’t need to buy any since I already have a drawer full of them – and to post at least one new sketch every day.   I’ll ask that you hold me to it by asking me when you don’t see a sketch posted on a particular day.

The first effort is this one, sketched in watercolor in a Kilimanjaro Originial Bright White Paint Book,  was done just off Sunderland Hill Road in Sunderland Vermont.   It’s been an unusually mild winter in Vermont so far. In the valleys and lower altitudes, there is hardly any snow on the ground.  This view looks northwest through an old forest.  Although it isn’t seen from this vantage point, there is a stream just on the other side of the large foreground trees.  Rather than snow showers, we were having rain showers, which left the puddles in the road.  The sky alternately cleared and clouded over as I painted so this is a designed composite of the rapidly changing look.

Contact me if you have an interest in this or any other paintings on the site. Email me at tc@tonyconner.com or by phone at 802-375-5548.

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Plein air artists Tony Conner & Elissa Gore painting in rainy conditions during the North Bennington Plein Air Competition, Sept. 8, 2011

The 2nd Annual North Bennington Plein Air Competition kicked off yesterday in the midst of heavy downpours of rain.    Managed to complete “North Bennington Train Yard” despite the rain.

The painting depicts a portion of one corner of the historic train station and the small yard that serves a local farm store and feed mill.

The event continues through the weekend with a number of public events scheduled.   See the event website for details – http://pleinair-northbennington.com/2011-schedule-of-events/

Weather on the first day of painting was a challenge. Very heavy rain most of the day had the artists doing their best to stay under some sort of cover and protect their paintings.

One painting done – “Satoh Tractors” – three to go.

The weather is great for plein air painting – sunny & warm with a light breeze.  Should be this way for the whole weekend.

Twenty artists are painting in and around Geneva, NY at the northern end of Seneca Lake today and tomorrow.  The paintings will be on exhibit tomorrow evening at the Opening Reception and again on Sunday afternoon.

Opening on Thursday, July 28th, is a two-person exhibit of new work from myself and ceramic artist Jessica Phillips.  The exhibit titled “Sacred Vessels & Vantages” features twelve new paintings created just for this exhibit.

With the theme words “sacred” & “vantages” I decided to create work in a format that would evoke the idea of vantages while focusing on the “sacred” moments of the rural landscape.  All twelve of these new paintings paintings were composed in this challenging format with the goal of creating works with balance, movement and visual focus.  These new works also bring focus to one aspect or another of a typical rural landscape in summer.

'Clouds& Sun II"

"Open Late"

The exhibit runs from July 28, 2011 through August 22, 2011 at the NAACO Gallery, 33 Main Street, North Adams, MA.

The public is invited to the Opening Reception on July 28th from 6 to 9pm.

Contact me if you have any questions, need directions or any other info.  Email me at tc@tonyconner.com or by phone at 802-375-5548.

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"On The Point"

This watercolor painting depicts the gradual and subtle changes that occur as winter changes to spring.  During this time of the year the light is slowly becomes brighter and warmer, earth that has spent weeks under layers of snow begins to reappear and streams thaw and begin to visibly run at the surface again.

This scene is late in the day with bright slanting light and it’s associated long shadows.  Like many of my works, this watercolor painting emphasizes warm/cool contrast in its color scheme – perfect for depicting the everchanging balance of cold and warm weather.

 
Contact me if you have an interest in this or any other paintings on the site. Email me at tc@tonyconner.com or by phone at 802-375-5548.

I enjoy welcoming visitors to my Studio Gallery. It is open by appointment – please contact me to arrange a visit.

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"End Of Season"

My latest landscape painting  began as a demonstration for my current “Landscape Painting in Watercolor” class. The class focuses specifically on the most efficient and effective techniques needed for painting watercolor landscapes.  Since the class is held indoors, we are working from photos.  The two reference photos  are shown below.  In this particular class, we combined images from the two photos while simplifying the subject and focusing on large shapes and in applying three basic kinds of watercolor washes – flat, graded & variegated.  By the end of class, the large foundation washes had been applied. I finished the painting in my studio principally by adding the touches of value, color and especially the textures needed to depict that time in autumn when the fields have been harvested, the leaves are gone and frost has removed the life and color from any remaining vegetation.

The reference photos are from scenes that are near but across the road from each other.  The sweeping, quiet rhythm of the fields from the left photo was attractive to me but I felt it needed more focus.  Adding the farm buildings and road from the right photo added the point of focus needed.

As is my tendency, the color in the finished painting has been enhanced with additional “chroma” or intensity and the field shapes along with the road enhance the feeling f movement.  I’m attracted to both the rhythm and contrast of open fields – both cultivated and uncultivated.  As mentioned above, farm fields – after the harvest – and open fields in the time after frost have unique textures.  Suggesting these textures is a visual cue as to the season – despite the color that is more expressive than realistic.

The content of the current class, plus some additional information, will be offered again in “Watercolor – the Essential Techniques” on the weekend of November 6 & 7, 2010.

Contact me if you have an interest in this or any other paintings on the site. Email me at tc@tonyconner.com or by phone at 802-375-5548.

I enjoy welcoming visitors to my Studio Gallery. It is open by appointment – please contact me to arrange a visit.

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"Under The Canopy"

This painting began as a demo for my recent “Painting the Autumn Landscape” workshop, held last weekend.  On Sunday, the second day of the workshop, we decided to set up on the grounds of the historic Park-McCullough House in North Bennington, Vermont.  The grounds have many paintable scenes, but this one which included these three old trees attracted our attention.  The day was mostly cloudy with sunshine breaking through now and then.

The twisted, gnarled and rough trunks of older trees, deep shade with bounced light, and the filtered sunlight found under the branches of  tall trees are all attractions for me.  The composition was a bit difficult due to the separation of the trees.  For an artist, it is always appropriate to change visual reality.  In this case, the biggest compositional decision early on was where to place the trees in relation to each other. The decision was to leave the proportional spacing nearly as it really exists, mostly because I wanted to capture the foliage of the largest tree in the middle – specifically, the different areas of  that were back lit against the areas that were shaded, along with the large “U” shaped branch on the left side. I wanted un-obscured views into these areas so knew that I couldn’t move the left hand tree much closer to the middle tree.   Because of that, I decided to leave the right hand tree pretty much in place as well – actually, it has been moved a bit closer to the middle tree to keep it in the picture plane. This decision left two large,un-interestingly shaped background spaces on either side of the main tree.   To add interest to the areas, I made sure to provide activation  – graded washes in the deep background and the shapes of some shrubs along the low stone wall.

The overall effect works fairly well, capturing the look of tall, old trees in early autumn with their glowing leaf canopies, deep and luminous shade on their trunks and dark shadow on the ground underneath.

Contact me if you have an interest in this or any other paintings on the site. Email me at tc@tonyconner.com or by phone at 802-375-5548.

I enjoy welcoming visitors to my Studio Gallery. It is open by appointment – please contact me to arrange a visit.

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Plein Air sketch - Hillside tree line

Three sketches completed during my weekend class “Painting the Autumn Landscape in Watercolor”.    On Saturday, the first day of the class, we climbed a hillside behind the Taraden Bed & Breakfast in North Bennington, VT to paint the the visible from that spot.  It was a beautiful early fall day – just warm enough and with bright sunshine interrupted periodically by one of the fluffy and fast-moving clouds.   From our spot, it was possible to view the a great deal of the  peaks of the Green Mountains – from the north east to the south.  To the south and west, the distant Taconic Range was also visible.  I did these sketches during the day.

The first sketch was done earlier in the day, when the sky had relatively few low clouds that cast their shadows over the mountains. Because they were moving, we could watch the shadows race over the surface of the hills and mountains.  One of the biggest challenges when painting “en plein air” is handling the constantly changing conditions, especially the light and shadow conditions on the ground.  The solution is to sketch, in pencil, the main forms and then watch for an attractive pattern of shadow. Once it appears, quickly add the shadow shapes in pencil.  Once you start painting, you can refer to the light areas of the mountains and hills to get the local color, and watch for more cloud shadows to get that color.

Each of these sketches is about 6 x 8 in size and each was completed in less than10  minutes.  For me, the key to lively plein air sketches is working quickly.  The other advantage is that it will train you to see both the shape and color of the scene you are painting very quickly, which translates to greater skill as an artist.

Contact me if you have an interest in this or any other paintings on the site. Email me at tc@tonyconner.com or by phone at 802-375-5548.

I enjoy welcoming visitors to my Studio Gallery. It is open by appointment – please contact me to arrange a visit.

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