Color Harmony in the Landscape

This fall I worked outside painting the light in the Snoqualmie Valley.  We live about 30 miles outside the city of Seattle, WA in the foothills of the Cascade Mountains.  For this series I tried to capture a harmony of light, or envelope of light, as my landscape instructor,  Mitch Albala calls it.  

In his book, Landscape Painting, Essential Concepts and Techniques for Plein Air and Studio Practice, Albala said, "A painting, of course, is not illuminated from within or enveloped by atmosphere, as is the actual landscape.  It exists on a two-dimensional surface and can only reflect light.  But the harmony and unifying effects of atmosphere can be imported into our paintings by using strategies that emphasize the similarities among colors, showing that there is a shared essence of every color in every other color."

Flowers

Red Begonias 14"x11" oil on linen

Just finished a 3-day flower workshop with Michael Klein at the Whidbey Island Fine Art Studio.  We worked in all natural light - no studio lights on the easels, no lights on the flowers except what was coming in from the windows!  It was great fun learning how Michael works - back to front, starting with the background and laying the flowers on top.  Painting flowers feels like plein air painting -  you have to work fast because the flowers will wilt throughout the day.  These begonias were actually potted so I wasn't too worried about them dying.   However, I must say that leaves DO rotate toward the light throughout the day which makes blocking them in a real challenge.  I love flowers!