Getting Back in the Game

I'm back in my winter location, Apalachicola, Florida.  With packing, driving, unpacking, and Christmas,  I haven't had much time to think about painting.  But now things are starting to slow down.  To ease back into it, I did what I always do:  I got out my sketchbook.  Since it was Christmas, I thought it appropriate to sketch a church.  The Catholic church has an interesting bell tower, so here is the result.

Merry Christmas to all!  And a Happy New Year!

Obliques and Interrupters

                                      "Assisi Hillside" 

I was browsing through old slides of my trips to Europe, and found this view of Assisi, Italy.  I was struck by two things:  the obliques in the scene and the towers that interrupted the obliques.  Three towers and one dome interrupt the dark line of the background hillside.  The light shape formed by the buildings are also surrounded by midtones that highlight the building shapes.  

I also considered the colors of the buildings and decided to contrast them with the quieter areas of foliage.  Since I knew that much of the foliage would be various gradations of green,  I decided

that the buildings, which were largely various shades of gray, needed to be a muted red to take advantage of the complementary colors of red and green.   Texture was only incorporated in the towers and some of the architecture, keeping the foliage areas relatively free of much texture.  

Again, I encourage you to alter the scenes in your photos to express a more dynamic expression of what you want to say about the subject matter.  Compose with your head to tell the story of what your heart responded to.

Here are the preparation sketch and drawing.