South of North Studio: August 2010

Early Morning at Bay Furnace

"Early Morning at Bay Furnace"
6x8 oil on canvas
Carol Horzempa

This is the second painting I've done of Bay Furnace on Lake Superior in the Upper Peninsula. My family camps up there every year and I again brought my paints hoping to paint along the shore. Instead I spent most my time either in the water, which was unusually warm this year or walking along the shore with my camera. This is a scene painted from a photo I took during my early morning walk.

Color Study of Tree

Color Study of Tree
oil on gessoed paper 3x5.5

I found this little tree while walking the dog near a man-made pond. The area is not much to look at but I wanted to see if I could make something interesting out of this scene while working on my greens.

I have scraps of watercolor paper from years past that I gessoed for these little studies. I used the same palette as the last one.

Last Farm Field

oil on gessoed watercolor paper
4x6

This farm field is surrounded by subdivisions just outside my village. The farmer still has sheep so I hope to get some more photos when the sheep are in the field.

This started out to be just a small color study on warm and cool greens but I had fun painting the fence and field and spent more time than planned. My palette colors were Cad. Yellow Light, Cad. Orange, Cad. Red Light, Alizarin Crimson, Cerulean Blue, Ultramarine Blue, Ivory black and Titanium White.

Painting Trees

Study
oil on gessoed watercolor paper
6x7.25

I thought I would share with you what I have been doing in my studio lately. I decided I needed a refresher course on painting trees. I would love to go out to the main source and paint directly from nature but the mosquitoes are more ravenous than ever in Wisconsin this year. Even repellent doesn't help much so I'm confined to my studio for now.

With this painting I followed a painting demo in Elizabeth Tolley's "Oil Painter's Solution Book Landscape." This is a great book on landscape painting with step-by-step demos and tons of valuable information.