Revisiting December on the Outer Banks of North Carolina

The start; sketch on the bottom and the plein air study off camera to the left

     Last week I came down with the respiratory infection that has been plagueing a lot of people.  I think plague is an apt word here.  I tried to find the silver lining and get some work done in the studio but I worked at the speed of a snail!  At the end of the week I started this enlargement of a plein air piece I did on December 30th on the Outer Banks.  You can check the blog entry for that day to see the painting. In any case I had the urge to do a larger one, albeit not a very much larger one.  I am staying faithful to my committment to work small this year ergo this is only a 16x20 inch painting.  I am painting it on the same kind of linen panel used for the plein air piece.


After todays work and still in progress


      I have come rather far with it and didn't stop to take many 'in progress" photos.  Right now I am not too  happy with the heavy impasto of the clouds as they come forward too much.  The paint is almost dry there so I will do a little sanding and either glaze or just paint more lightly over the area.  I may also eat away a little of the cloud mass with some more blue sky.  I'll have to see. What I like to do when I have questions like that is to print out a copy of the painting as it is and then use pastels to make my adjustments on the copy.  You would be surprised what a great tool that is!  It really helps me make up my mind without acting on the original painting.
      The day I painted the plein air piece there was a couple walking alone on the beach both wearing long, flowing white robes.  I would like to paint them into this painting.  The plein air painting was too small and there wasn't much beach exposed.  I will use my copy and pastels to place them before I paint them in.
      We are having a very gray, dreary spell of weather and it feels so good to work with these warm, saturated colors.  I just turn my back on the gray out the windows and look toward the painting.  I hope you feel the warmth!