 |
| Peonies by Nina Jarmolych Koski |
“If a watched pot never boils, how can a flower completely
open while you’re painting it?” asked Nathan Tomlinson at Highland Park on
Saturday. I could see his point. At 10 AM when he sketched his idea onto his
canvas, the peony in question was half-open. By 2, when we left, it was wilted.
 |
| Pretty wilted but still beautiful by mid-afternoon. |
The change in the flowers was unusually dramatic, because we
were making a dizzying leap from cold spring rain into glorious summer weather.
All of Rochester realized it, too, and came out to photograph the flowers.
 |
| Peonies, by Nathan Tomlinson. |
I didn’t realize it was Memorial Day weekend until we were mobbed
by tourists. At one point, Nina Koski leaned over and whispered, “There are
four different languages being spoken right next to us.” Since I love playing tour guide, I had a great
time directing people to the lilacs, the pansy bed, and the conservatory, and
explaining what a pinetum is.
 |
| Peony, by Jingwei Yang. |
These three are all very inexperienced painters: Nate has
been with me since early February, Jingwei and Nina since the end of February.
Their progress has been fantastic in a very short time, and they’re making the
leap to plein air painting with a
great deal of self-assurance.
 |
| Who can resist photographing the darn things? |
The biggest problem they faced was that their palettes
couldn’t match the chromatic intensity of the peonies themselves, gilded by
back light on this beautiful, intense day. Nate, who is using muddy Charvin oil
paints, had the most trouble, but there are many things in the natural world
that are more intense than any paint can match. The answer, then, is to make
the chroma you can muster up sing against the background.
 |
| Peonies by little ol' me. |
I had time to do a small watercolor between annoying my
students. The nature of watercolors makes it a little easier to give the
illusion of high chroma even with a limited sketch kit, so I didn’t suffer quite as much as they did.
Come paint with me in Belfast, ME! Information
is available here:
No comments:
Post a Comment