Mystic River Festival

 The Farm Stand

14x17 oil and acrylic on board

photo at the Mystic River Festival

Last Saturday afternoon I painted with a group of plein air painters at the Mystic River Festival in Medford.  I had done this before and had a great time-good food, music and the young man operating the farm stand provided me with apple cider and donuts!  And the sun came out.  Jenn DesAutels, painter and illustrator (Jennifer Cheng DesAutels Illustrations: StudioJCD.com), did a great job of organizing us and also arranged for the paintings to be shown at Mystic Coffee Roaster in Medford, 30 Riverside Ave., Medford. The opening is tomorrow and the paintings will be on display for a month.

Thanks, Jenn!

Does sitting on a painting improve it?

preliminary oil sketch

17x11 RayMar canvas panel

Well that's a good question.  I'd say it did. I painted this a week ago an placed it on the front passenger seat of my car.  The next week I let my grand daughter out of her car seat and she hopped in front and sat right on the wet canvas!  We were both surprised and able to laugh about how she helped me paint.  This inspired an attempt to capture the image again by print making with a Gelli plate.  Here are three versions, none of which I love but thought I'd share them.  I'll continue to work with this image as I find it captivating and it brings back the memory of standing at the foot of the hill which overlooks the harbor in Skopelos, Greece.  There had been a wedding at the church and there were 3 inch strips of mylar littering the ground, thus adding a magical quality.  When I climbed up for a look inside there was a service going on, complete with chanting, incense, a priest and a small group of worshipers.  A solemn moment so rich with history.  And the rocks were beautiful-a sheer wall of them below the church which was built onto them.