Bivins House

I’ve gotten all settled in at Vermont Studio Center and it’s a wonderful relaxing feeling.  I arrived yesterday and toured the facility and met some of the people.  After dinner, I was so exhausted that I went to bed about 8:30.

What a wonderful night’s sleep!

My alarm was set for seven, but only about five minutes before that I woke up naturally.

With a hearty Vermont breakfast under my belt, I’m ready to begin this wonderful experience.  It’s wonderful to be with other artists and writers, and the staff go out of their way to make it a very community oriented experience.  After only a single day, I can feel that clearly.  I think this is going to be great.

My first workshop is figure drawing, but before it starts, I plan to wander around a bit and take some pictures.

After returning from making assorted mundane purchases at Grand Union, I decided to paint outside.  It was cool this morning, but the day is warming nicely.  It promises to be a lovely day.

I’ve been thinking about the book I’ve been reading, Visual Intelligence.  Looking at things from the author’s viewpoint, I notice that I can see more things than my camera can capture, and I think that’s what for me about painting outside.

Peripheral images while not distinct are an integral part of the whole picture, so I feel surrounded and involved by the totality of the scene.

One of the reasons why I am here was to explore outside of my comfort zone, so I elected to make my first landscape a bit abstract.  The one I’m working on now is a bit more traditional but I’m drawing on a number of the value studies and putting a bit more detail in the trees.

Of course, there isn’t a lot of detail here, so it shouldn’t be that big of a deal.  I’m just trying to capture a sense of the place and the darks and lights.  It’s Spring here and things are just beginning to bud.

The trees largely seem grey but they also have that glowing “bud green” sparkling all over them.  To me this is the essence of Spring: just beautiful.  I hope that I can capture that in my painting.  I’m planning to make at least two attempts.  One against the sky and clouds; one against the trees.