The day after painting at Ghost Ranch my car was still in the repair shop so my painting partner and I took off again to paint, driving just a few miles South of Santa Fe where there's a small area full of unusual rock formations. Both Nancy and I choose to paint this one. My challenge was to simplify in order to catch the essence of the "flow" of the rocks...not so easy! I like this painting yet feel as though it's a bit flat in that I really didn't capture the light right (it was a hazy day)...maybe this need to be painted again?

20 x 16" oil on canvas

I haven't had a great deal of time to get out to paint plienair this year but I did take a day this summer and went to Ghost Ranch and painted this arroyo scene. I'm challenging myself to work larger when I'm out for a day. That means I can't get caught up in the small details but focus instead on the shapes and colors of the most important elements of what I'm painting.

16 x 20" oil on canvas

I painted this pathway at a nature preserve just south of Santa Fe a couple of years ago. It's rather classic for me and stylistic going back to my earliest plienair painting style.

16 x 20" oil on canvas

A different view of the same garden as in the last posted painting. When I'm on site for several days I often will do more than one painting as the light shifts. This is a looser and thinner approach. I was experimenting with an additive to my oil paint which made building color over color difficult while working into the wet paint. Again I didn't finish this for several years, liking it as it was and finally just doing the smallest amount of touch up to finish it off.

16" x 20" oil on canvas

I painted this several springs ago and nearly had it finished but didn't do the last 1% needed until just before the show....I liked this painting so much and finishing it meant it could sell! Originally I painted this on site over 2 days. It's a garden along Canyon Road in Santa Fe, but could be almost anywhere.

20 x 20" oil on canvas

This little painting was done in the studio partly looking across the river from my studio window but also mixing up memory views from my neighborhood. Thick paint and pushing the color made this fun to do.

6 x 8" oil on canvas sold

Again; another 6 x8 painting of the view from my studio. I don't normally frame my art but these small works really benefit from a frame, setting them off and making them extra special. I don't always like the traditional foiled and carved frames for plienair works and looked for a more contemporary approach, using linen liners and simple wood tone frames 1 1/2 to 2" deep. I wanted the painting to stand out, not be overwhelmed by the framing...

View from the Studio 6" x 8" oil on canvas sold

I've recently started to paint very small 6" x 8" canvas, having bought a thumb box for plienair painting. I'm so use to working larger! This little painting went through various changes over it's birth and it ended up with thick paint in a stylized manner...I was thinking of the painting I saw in the Orsay Museum (I think) that Paul Serusier painted under the direction of Paul Gauguin in the late 1880"s. Not so similar really yet that was in the back of my mind as I painted this one.... It's of a view from my studio window.

8 x 6 oil on canvas, sold

This is the other painting based on the photo I took from a bridge down in a canyon of the Rio Grande. Working off photos in the studio can be a challenge to keep the freshness and spontaneity happening. I often paint more than one painting off a subject; trying different view points, playing with color or experimenting with different painterly approaches. I used brush and palette knife for this painting.

16" x 16" oil on canvas

This painting received a great deal of interest during my show at Aura Dez Fine Art; yet it didn't sell. The strong contrast and background colors seem to be what people really liked about it. I worked off a photo I took down in the Rio Grande while I stood in the middle of a bridge looking down river and into the sun. The photo made the canyon walls very dark and mysterious. I actually painting 2 paintings of this view, this was the second.

16 x 16" oil on canvas