I just got home from a week in California teaching a great group of students. We had tons of fun working on our plein air paintings, and improving the color in our work. Now I'm back home and already looking forward to my next class, which will be at Chesapeake Fine Art Studio on the eastern shore of Maryland in March. Almost all of my classes focus on painting the landscape on site, because that's how I learned the most in my own work. Plein air painting demands a speed, gesture, simplicity and honesty. Painting the landscape on site allows us to see an incredibly rich variety of hues, and I love sharing my own excitement about those colors. In my last few workshops I've increased my focus on how I use color when painting. I want my paintings to tell the story of what I'm most excited about. In recent years, that is often an interest in color relationships, and how they create the glow of a sunny day, or can interact in subtle harmonies in overcast light. As I focus on these ideas in my own paintings, I like to explore them with my workshops. As Charles Hawthorne said, "The right spots of color will tell you more about the appearance, the likeness of a person, than features or good drawing. Make it so that I could recognize the subject from color alone, for color is also a likeness. Remember no amount of drawing will pull you out if your colors are not true. The spot of color that a model makes against the landscape has much more to do with his character than you imagine. Do that and you have something to work with."
This class will be a great opportunity to refocus your plein air painting skills as we get ready for spring and summer, and spending more time working outside in fresh air. If you would like to join us, the class is March 23-26 and will cost $750. The studio phone number is 410-200-8019