Ladies View, Killarney National Forest, Ireland

8"x10" oil on linen mounted on archival panel

For more information, or to purchase, click here.

I've been back home for a week and a half now. Lots of things going on here at home, birthdays for me and my hubby, which is always fun- we tend to celebrate for the both of us all week!  The latest "twist in family life" is that my mom (80+ years old) needs an appendectomy...at least it's not an emergency and they had time to schedule this, so I'll be going down to FL to stay with her during this episode! 

My visit to Ireland flew by so quickly! I really did savor each day.  The weather was quite beautiful and was the sunniest I'd ever spent over there! On Wednesday of our week there, our group went over to Killarney National Forest. In the morning we stopped at Ross Castle.  I had never been in to tour the place, though I had seen the outside a few times.  So rather than setting up my oil painting rig that morning, I took the tour of the castle, and still had a bit of time to get a quick sketch in my watercolor sketchbook!

After lunch in Killarney, we went through the National Forest to Ladies View, our painting spot for the afternoon.  Brilliantly sunny, the cloud shadows on the mountains were changing constantly, as was the light effects.  But it was quite an interesting challenge. I determined I wanted to get the big shapes down quickly as the light effects were changing quite rapidly, this first painting is almost abstract in its view and effect (shown at the top of this post).  By the time I finished this one, I still had some time left for another start. The light had changed a bit more in this same view, a short while later. I wanted to experiment with these two pieces since I had the time and location to do so. The first one was done with almost all brush, the second with almost all palette knife.  The experiment was interesting for me.   

(For more information or to purchase this view, 
"Ladies View, II", please click here. )
I really enjoyed coming back to this familiar view. It's been painted by thousands of artists from all over the world, it's quite an amazing view, in any season, any weather.