Moving From Florals To Landscapes

It is never easy changing genres. You finally, FINALLY get the feel for one and then, in boredom most likely, you switch gears again. I am firmly convinced that it is the tension for improvement that keeps any artist great. If we fall into a rut, and trust me, it is SOOO easy to do, we begin to stagnate and finally become a cliche of ourselves. It is always a challenge to create something new, or at least, new to me. I have a need to try something new and easily become bored with the old.

Beginning of CHINESE DREAMSCAPE

CHINESE DREAMSCAPE was an image that struck me when a friend sent it to me. He grew up here but it had both wonderful and terrible memories of his childhood. It seemed so dreamlike that you can never imagine it being terrible. Life has a strange way of altering what we consider to be beauty and terror.

I covered the entire canvas with a light peach, almost flesh color. It seemed this color was everywhere and I've learned nothing compliments greens more than a rich under layer of peach tones.

It took awhile to add the blues as there were many blues in the distant mist and they made themselves known in the left foreground as well. Despite the deep greens and browns not yet blocked in, the sky and distant hills were going to show through soon enough.

Forming masses for CHINESE DREAMSCAPE

My wise teacher cautioned me to start with the distance and then work my way forward. So, working with darker to lighter blues, then adding white to a baby blue and finally white I was able to create the dreamlike effect that distance had. In the lower left I continued with the blues because soon there will be deep browns and greens that bump into each other as ripples on the water.

This is not completed, in fact there is still a great deal left to do! Yet, in many respects it has already achieved a dream like state. This is a painting unlike any I have ever done before.

There is almost a good reason to stop. Maybe with a little more color in the lower right side bottom, this could be a completed painting. It  has a dreamlike quality that could be compromised if I continued. Will I stop? Probably not because I already have in my minds eye the painting I want. However, as most artists will attest, you NEVER know what may happen along the way. I think that's always the challenge of art (and design)!