A week of watercolor.  Many of my group are back painting and I will get back to adding to the blog.  There are new painters and they are very good.  this pushes me to get more done.  

Painting at the UCDavis Arboretum

Our group was out on a beautiful morning painting along the creek.  I put additional color into the painting to offset the total green that is everywhere.  I did manage two paintings in 2 hours since I really stayed with my mop brush for to do most of the painting.  There is so much material on the campus which is very empty with  the shutdown. 

Arboretum Bridge

Today is Wednesday and we are all at the University of California, Davis arboretum.  Lots of construction going on but plenty of parking.  There are bikes and people exercising but not many.  The birds are singing this morning and it is still cool.  I do look for shade and then paint very quickly.  First, a value study and then I paint the subject.  The value study is a great help with editing out all of the things I do not need in the painting.  There are many different types of bridges along the creek that runs through the campus.  The land around the tree is gravel with very tiny dried leaves.  I left it to the cast shadow and color change.  In previous posts of painting in the arboretum I have argued about the vegetation and what to put in the painting.  I have the same problem here so left most of it without detail.

Morning at Willow Creek

We gathered at Willow Creek, a nice shady spot on a predicted hot day in Davis, CA.  The creek is dry but has this  bridge over it with plenty of rocks where the water runs when wet after a rain.  The area is without bugs.  It is just beside a bike path and there were plenty of bikes.  

Morning in the Redwoods

This Wednesday our plein air group went to the UC Davis Arboretum.  It was very windy but deep on the floor of the Redwood section we were sheltered from it.  There are many redwoods and they grow quite close to each other.  There are breaks and light comes through.  I tried to capture this as the streaks come and go.  It gets darker in the distance with light at the top.  I've tried to handle this with a lighter green background as well as thickness of the tree trunks.  I put a couple of figures in black to give an idea of proportion.  

Patchwork Farm Lavender

With temperatures reaching triple digits, the lavender crop was ready early. We went out to beautiful Capay Valley to take it in and paint. Things were buzzing with the pickers ranch hands. The fields appear to have a lavender cloud over them with the green base. It brought me back to years being in southern France seeing and smelling the field of lavender. It was a bit difficult to find shade for painting but the setting is so nice with the blue sky and Capay hills in the background. Thank you to the people of Patchwork Farm.

Morning Stroll

During the quarantine I've been trying several ways of showing the arboretum. For a couple months I have painted all over the paths that wind through the beautiful plants and trees. I do not want a realistic painting of them. What first calls to me are the shadows and the lights created by all of the vegetation, so that is what I emphasize in this painting.