Outside the Tasting Room (Gouveia Winery)

9"x12" oil on Belgian linen mounted on archival board

“What is the definition of a good wine? It should start and end with a smile.”
-William Sokolin

Today I met up with several members of the CT Plein Air Painters Society to paint at the Gouveia Winery in Wallingford, CT. It sits atop a high hill with some incredible views. Before I left the house I had in mind painting some wonderful converging rows of grapevines. But there were several other things that caught my eye as well. This grouping of old oak barrels, vats, presses, along the rock wall as you enter the tasting room was hard to resist. The brilliant sky this morning really set off the white cupola and weather vane atop the roof line. I'm thinking this will be a wonderful place to go back to visit in the fall, as the expansive vista from the hilltop is incredible!

This painting is available to purchase directly from my DailyPainters.com gallery store.

The Perils and Pleasure of Plein Air/Split Boulder at Bluff Point oil sketch

6"x 8" oil sketch on linen mounted on panel

"Do not be timid and squeamish.....All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make, the better." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Sometimes going out to paint en plein air is filled with risk. You can manage a lot of risk by just being prepared. It does get easier over time. But there are those outings where you know you'll have to put some extra thought into it. I've been wanting to bring my paints out to the end of Bluff Point (here in Groton, CT), where the big split boulders lay at the edge of the water. It's about 2 miles out from where you park your car so I knew I'd have to pack really light. I've narrowed down my gear over the years and I've written about my back pack & set-up in a previous post back in April. But there's no way I'm willing to haul that out for two miles on a warm day! So, I decided I'd put my little "pochade box" to use. Some folks call it a thumb box, as there is a hole in the bottom for your thumb to fit, so you can hold it while you paint. It holds a little 6"x8" panel, a tiny palette for your paint, and room for short handled brushes under that. Not much room, but not much weight either. I decided to stick to Tim Bell's limited palette that I had tried out the other day, which is a few tubes less than what I normally carry.

There's a bumper crop of poison ivy out there this year, so I made sure to watch out for that as well as trying to keep out of the brushy areas to avoid ticks! Found a rock to sit on that provided a decent view. The only thing I'd do differently next time is to bring a cushion (of some type) to sit on. I usually stand when I paint with my regular set-up (an 8x10" Open Box M). But with this tiny hand-held box, I knew I'd want to sit. I'd be out in the open with no shade, so I had to turn and get myself situated so that there was no sun hitting my canvas or palette. It can be done, but it wasn't easy. I wasn't sure I was going to be happy at all with this little study. I had hoped to use this as a study for a larger work. The air was perfect out there today & the fragrance of salty sea air mingled with wild honey-suckle is pretty wonderful. Like the fisherman who claims "Even a bad day fishing is better than a good day at......(you fill in the blank). I knew that I'd had a good morning whether I was happy or not with the sketch. I pulled it out of the box a few hours after I got home & looked at it from across the room. Yes, truth! The essence of that brilliant light that I was after was there after all! So, for the box I rarely use, I did find that it served me well to keep things really small and light for this little bit of exploration! I plan to get some more sketches out there. It is one of my favorite places to hike and has been for over the last sixteen years. We have a lot of family memories there.

So even though I wouldn't consider this one a 'finished painting' I did get what I was after. A good collection of color notes to remember the day by and serve me well as a good resource for a larger painting. I've added a little photo of the thumb-box (or pochade box, sounds like po- shawd) so you can see what a tiny thing it really is. I don't love using it, but it really serves it's purpose for a long trek!

Red Right Returning

15"x30" oil on deep gallery wrapped linen

Everybody's talking at me.
I don't hear a word they're saying,
Only the echoes of my mind.
People stopping staring,
I can't see their faces,
Only the shadows of their eyes.

I'm going where the sun keeps shining
Thru' the pouring rain,
Going where the weather suits my clothes,
Backing off of the North East wind,
Sailing on summer breeze
And skipping over the ocean like a stone.
- Harry Nilsson

As I was posting this painting, I just kept thinking about "sailin' on a summer breeze"...and honestly - if you're my age, you just can't say that phrase without singing it to Harry Nilsson's tune. With all the chilly rain we've had lately, this is one fine daydream, to recall the sunny days out on the water last summer! Watching the boats go by!

Red Sails In The Harbor - sold

8"x6" oil on linen on archival board (Raymar)

"The ocean has always been a salve to my soul...the best thing for a cut or abrasion was to go swimming in salt water. Later down the road of life, I made the discovery that salt water was also good for the mental abrasions one inevitably acquires on land."
- Jimmy Buffett

Ahh, so true! After a long miserable winter....while waiting for the garden to emerge in spring...there's nothing like the first days when it's warm enough to 'bring out the boats'. That's the best part of living on the shoreline here in New England. I spent part of a recent weekend here in Mystic & Stonington just watching boats, hanging out by the water. After spending most of my adult life near the shore, I don't think I could ever move inland again. And of all the boats I spotted, I was really intrigued by this one in Stonington harbor with the red sails, backlit by the late afternoon sun...heading back into the harbor.