In this painting, I was working along a busy road in the early morning light. Selecting this composition, allowed me give the viewer the long view of the farm.  Enjoying the subtle pinks in the sky and the distant view of the fields was as important as including the silo and barns. The dark shape of the vegetation was a real plus as it not only covered the second silo but served as a strong dark nestling the larger neutral  barn.

This work is created with: Rembrandt, Sennelier and Great American pastel.

This work is created on: Pastel Premier pastel paper.

In this painting I am working at a farm that is steeped in history.  Established in the 1820's by the Bean Family and continuously  owned by their ancestors. Working on a bright day without any true sun, I arrived and selected this composition. The view of the 500 plus acres was important to the vista that I wanted to include it along with the aging structures.

This work is created with: Rembrandt, Sennelier and Great American pastel.

This work is created on: Pastel Premier pastel paper.

In this painting I again chose an afternoon view.  Wanting to capture the shadow on the main barn and that necessitated being on site about 2 pm to achieve this.  My gosh but it was hot.  Now I know why I like the morning light and those morning temperatures.  The fields were planted with soybean and I  found that hiking out to put a little distance between me and the subject matter did nothing to cool me down! As always I learned a lot from working en plein air and hope to revisit this site in the fall.

This work is created with: Rembrandt, Sennelier and Great American pastel.

This work is created on: Pastel Premier pastel paper.

In this composition I am working in the afternoon light. I felt I had exhausted most the views of the morning light with the exception of one.  Here again I am focusing on the three silos and the arrangement of distant buildings.  I especially liked the old metal building in the foreground and enjoyed glazing the pastel to give the effect of rust through broken color.

This work is created with: Rembrandt, Richeson, Sennelier and Great American pastel.

This work is created on: Pastel Premier pastel paper.

In this painting the addition of the three silos gives a little added interest to the composition. Again the lights in the sky are so close in value to the lights in the two barns. The emptiness of the farm gives it a feeling of abandonment of human connection.

This work is created with: Rembrandt, Richeson, Sennelier and Great American pastel.

This work is created on: Pastel Premier pastel paper.

In this painting the day dawned bright, but quickly clouded in with high cirrus clouds.  Here my light values are very close to the lights of the sky. The starkness of this composition gives the viewer a sense neglect and emptiness. 

In this composition I selected the three silos as my subject matter. Enjoying the simplicity of the forms and neutral colors of the silos, the pop of color on the one silo top and the rich soils in the foreground were enough to entice me to work yet again this day.

This work is created with: Rembrandt, Richeson, Sennelier and Great American pastel.

This work is created o: Pastel Premier paper

Farming is such a nobel tradition. Couple this tradition with the abundance of farms in Jackson county and one might come close to knowing why I love to paint farms.  Morning is my favorite painting time. The light is special and the earth seems renewed by the quiet of the night. In composing this painting, I enjoyed the view between the barn and the other out building. The promise of the corn crop is barely perceived, but subtlety suggested with a greyed green swipe of pastel.

This work is created with: Rembrandt, Richeson, Sennelier and Great American pastel.

This work is created on: Pastel Premier pastel paper

Early the final day of painting in Mackinaw City, I selected a view looking east and stood on the shore of Lake Huron. Rising so as to catch some hints of pink in the morning sky I composed this view of the Old Mackinac Lighthouse. Here I sentimentally included some of the pink and purple lilac bushes that were in full bloom.

Spending the day over on Mackinac Island, we headed back for dinner at our hotel.  A cool and beautiful evening stretched before me, so not to waste an opportunity to paint I headed back to the Old Mackinac Lighthouse.  In this composition I painted the Mighty Mac Bridge in the background and the subtle water of the Straits.  The day had been cloudless, but the evening supported some active clouds blowing across the lakes. I enjoyed the warm colors of the building juxtaposed against the cool of the sky and the lakes.

Setting up early one morning I drew a thumbnail sketch of the Mackinac Lighthouse.  When I make my drawing I pay particular attention to the light and shadow patterns.  I have found that when I make the drawing rather than taking the time to shade in the dark patterns, I merely outline the edge of the dark and quickly mark the dark with an "s" which indicates a shadow in my artistic shorthand.  Proceeding with my drawing I then go on and mark with a "l" my light patterns. Likewise, I use this shorthand further to mark any reflected lights with a quick "rl". I have found this method allows me to work more quickly, which certainly is helpful when working en plein air.  This allows me to stick to my initial drawing with the observed light patterns.  I have found that a sure way to ruin a plein air painting is to chase the lights or continually paint the lights patterns as they change.

Further, using my thumbnail sketch, I begin my drawing on my pastel paper.  Here I am using Pastel Premier paper that I have under painted with watercolor. Typically I select a paper that has the thirds painted horizontally or vertically which ever format I am using.  I like to use a yellow underpainting on the top third, a blue underpainting on the middle third and a red underpainting on the lower third.  I use a watercolor pencil to mark my vertical thirds.  This way I know exactly where my intersection of thirds lie and I can compose with that knowledge. This method of thirds was also employed in my initial sketch so it allows me to draw my subject on a similar format.

After my drawing is all set on my paper, I begin painting the sky.  This allows me to layer my pastel application and limits when I have to paint around any object.  This is not to say that cutting in with pastel as a correction never occurs. But  using the theory that I am painting what is furthest away from me and I then proceed to the middle ground.  Artists know that using this method of working back to front also allows the artist now to work over and destroy the already applied pastel. Now even though I am really working quickly keeping my eye on my initial drawing of value patterns I continually step back and survey my strokes.  

Heading north in June I decided to paint within the walls of Fort Mackinac.  (Notice that Mackinaw City chooses to spell its name ending in w and Mackinac Island and Fort Mackinac have adopted the spelling ending with a c.)  It was a very windy day especially given that the fort sits right on the straits and experiences the winds of both Lake Huron and Lake Michigan. I found the fort a challenge on two fronts: one because of the limited vantage points due to the fence that surrounds the fort and secondly the buildings represented a substantial amount of neutrals. I had to push my warms and cools to achieve any sense of color. But it was a good exercise and I enjoyed the change of subject matter.