Artwork to Celebrate Autumn!

Once again, small gouache and acrylic paintings . . . trying to work quickly so as not to beat the poor things to death with intellectual and artistic angst . . .

This work is another experiment with using acrylics as watercolor -- loose and juicy -- on Wallis sanded paper. By spraying and letting things drip and dribble, the pumiced surface catches the paints and creates these amazing swirls, almost a marbleizing effect. Again, another riverscape, no particular place or time, just trying to catch the light and those elusive reflective qualities of the water.


This little work is a quick exercise in timing -- I was packing up my paints on the deck as the sun was setting and it was becoming quite chilly. Suddenly I looked up and the sun was just hitting a stand of pines with smaller understory trees lighting up from below -- so marvelous that I grabbed the last of the gouache and a large mop brush. Because of the size of the brush, there could be no detail. In any event, I truly like this little piece and its "extreme" looseness.


This piece returns me to my first love of the Connecticut River, which I travel along in my daily commute. It was my hope to capture an impressionistic sweep, more an ambiance of how the river feels at times throughout the autumn -- sometimes quiet and dim with mists floating along the edges; at other times, parts appear on fire with the maple and birch trees alight, yet with these lovely purple shadows lurking along the shorelines, the russets and golds broken up by the spruce blue and deep green of the pines.

A few more weeks may be left before this New England autumn closes in upon itself and gently moves into early winter. Another season calls for another shift in palettes, another study of the light changes . . . an artist's work is never done!