Gray

Gray

8x8

oil on cradled panel
sold

Switching gears a little, on the third day at the Emma Lake workshop I decided to go to the beach and give the greens a break! I wanted to play with mixing grays and painting in a faster, looser way. I didn't specifically limit my palette here, but in the end I didn't use a lot of colours anyway. I had ordered some cradled panels when they were on sale from Opus, so I used one to see how it compared to the MDF boards I had been enjoying the previous days. The cradled panel I used for this painting was sealed with my new, trusty GAC-100 (Golden), so the pale colour of the wood showed through. In fact, I discovered that the colour of the wood was almost an exact match to Naples Yellow! There was not a huge difference between the cradled panels and the MDF boards. They are both obviously hard surfaces compared to canvas, which is what I am used to. The biggest difference was that the MDF boards were perfectly smooth, slippery even. The cradled panels had a slightly rougher surface, so there was a bit more "grab" with them.

It was a peaceful morning; very quiet, calm water, no breeze. I parked myself at the end of the dock. I had never painted there before, but since I had seen others set up in that spot I figured it would be okay. I slipped into my meditative painting mode quite easily. There was a canoe nearby on the other side of some reeds. I think the people were fishing, so any conversation they had was very soft and didn't bother my concentration. I'm easily startled when I paint because I guess I get kind of absorbed in what I am doing. Well, it wasn't long before I was being startled left and right! Why??? Because there were fish jumping everywhere... on my side of the reeds!!! It was unbelievable! If the fishermen only knew!  

I am including a photo I took looking back toward the campus from the end of the dock where I was painting. The building you see on the left is the cafeteria building. The dining hall is a circular shape and has a wrap-around, screened-in porch facing the lake. It feels like you are eating outside, but there are no insects! Very clever, very enjoyable. In this picture you can also see Adirondack chairs surrounding a fire pit and a cabin tucked into the trees.

Sigh. It is a wonderful place. It has a rich history that most don't know about... someday I will try to give it to you in a nutshell. For now I am typed out!