Sunday n' Nelson County, Va.

Painting on a Sunday is always going to be kind of a spiritual experience and painting nearby a Church service is no doubt going to bring into being the Church building as subject matter for my canvas. That's how I got going with this particular painting. I was out in the middle of a field with nothing much more and trees and sky to paint but there was this Church that stood far away but very visible, it was red against the green of foliage. And so this painting came about quickly but most assuredly the composition made itself.

Comments

Post a Comment

What Has Worked;

Japanese Paintings On Display

Image
The show is up. Many of my paintings were hung up yesterday, and there was nothing like seeing all of them up and together where I or anyone could see them all together and view them all at the same time. It was quite something. The opening will be this coming Friday evening but they hung them all up yesterday. It was a couple of dedicated women who hung all the work in the gallery. The Virginia Artist In Action has treated me well, they welcomed me into their gallery and have done a good job showing my artwork to the local area. I have nothing but good things to say about them because of their hard work to promote my art. Now I feel like I have to make as many newer paintings as there are hanging on the walls of the VAIA gallery. I'm kind of obsessive about doing paintings and having a good number of new ones accessible to the galleries or otherwise ready to show to the public. I have to learn to be happy with just what I have and what I have spent the last...
Read more

Hut for a Blue Tractor and a Red Grass-Cutter

Image
     Many of these farm structures that I live around out here in Central Virginia near Lovingston are made from wood that has been recycled from earlier farm buildings.   I am almost certain that a lot if it may just go back to the early days of European settlers locating here in Schuyler.   One can just take a quick look and even without carbon-dating one can see that the wood is old and weathered by the elements.   It is very heavy older hardwood that these folks used in making their farm structures.   One can also see how the buildings were shaped for the needs of the farm at a time and then torn down but not discarded but reused again for another purpose..   The sizes of the buildings are small.   They may house one farm implement or two but they are not like those northern Atlantic barns that have lofts and large areas for animals, these buildings are built to suite a single purpose and generally aren'...
Read more

The Barn on the Holland Farm

Image
    This building had been painted earlier, just not from this angle.   I took a top downward look in this composition in oil.    I liked the perspective of the fence running downhill and swooping around into the back of the barn.   I was thinking that I had made an error in judgement when I painted the one side of the barn in shadow, but after working moreso I saw that it seemed to work since the shade is marked with details of the wooden doors, and other details worked out in blues and dark browns.   As they say, getting some distance by letting it sit for a while without me looking at it allowed me to really see that what I had done was ok in fact it worked pretty well.       I feel that this canvas is successful, but its one that a person needs to take a good look at what one is seeing before deciding if it works as a work of art or not.   You don't want to just gloss over it with a quick ...
Read more

Esmont and the Bank

Image
There are places both on the map and sort of forgotten about and off the map of frequent travelers. The town of Esmont is one such place, it's just off a main east/west highway in Central Virginia. It had it's hayday from what I've learned mostly during the time of the roaring Twenty's and such...I think most of these place benefited mostly from the mining going on in the nearby town of Schulyer. Now the mining is limited and the town of Esmont has but a few families living in it's homes. The most noteworthy building I found to be the old bank building which was nice deep red from the brick used in it's construction. It's the only brick building in the town that I could find, but it's a nice three story building with some nice features to it with the name "Esmont Bank" still built into it's brickwork above the main doorway. With the sun out and mild temps I headed over to the quite town. I set up and painted for about th...
Read more

The First Structure in Nelson County of European Settlers

Image
 I asked this local resident just what that old wooden structure was standing over yonder near some parked cars, she informed me that the wooden stack was the earliest home for Nelson County Residents back in the times when this county was established.   I couldn't believe it, you mean it was of that kind of historical value and it was simply a stand alone building in the backyard of one of Schuyler's residents with no markings of its significant value?   I had to paint it.   So I snapped a photo of it and took it home, then got to work.   Its simply the size of a small compact car only made of weathered wood.      To paint it took little time due to its small size.   I believe I will paint it again due to the feeling that it is owed some more attention that I have given it.   I also cropped some of the building off so I want to include that part in the next painting.
Read more