Plein Air Painting
I’ve been painting outdoors all my life, but I don’t consider myself a“plein air painter.”
My friend Joy Wright is a plein air painter. She paints in oils, hiking into the woods carrying a heavy backpack, an easel, paints and brushes. She carries tools to adjust her easel and has paint on her clothes. Recently she bought and put together a bike with a basket, so she could ride to places that wouldn’t accommodate a car. Plein air painters go to “paint-outs” where there are often contests and monetary prizes. Joy often wins first or second place.
I paint in watercolor working in a paper size I can easily carry. I paint in the Brooklyn Botanic Garden or Prospect Park, near my apartment. Sometimes I visit Joy, in the Poconos. We drive and hike to waterfalls, climb down a hill, under a bridge and walk along the Delaware River, trying not to get mosquito bites or ticks to find a good spot to paint.
Once we painted along the railroad tracks on the side of a mount ain. Joy assured me that the train never comes. This time it did and we had to scramble to get up, collect our paints and get off the tracks before the train reached us. It was scary!
I like being in nature. It is always changing. The light changes and the shadow get longer, the sun comes out and goes away. I like the weather, the sun warming my body, the wind, the shadows and light. The mosquitos I could do without.
Main Street, Portland
This past weekend I visited Joy while she was getting ready for Plein Air 2021 at the Antoine Dutot Museum which she is in every year. She had 3 paintings started. Artists have 2 weeks to paint en plein air ad then there is an exhibition, opening party and silent auction. She asked if I wanted to do some paintings to put in it and I jumped at the chance. I had 3 days over Labor Day Weekend before I had to go home to Brooklyn to work.
We spent the weekend painting in the Delaware Water Gap. I did watercolors. Joy painted in oils. The first day her granddaughter, who is 7, painted with us. I put her in my painting and she was very happy. The second day it rained for most of the day. By 4:30 it stopped raining but everything was wet. We drove to Portland, a town along the Delaware River, We set up on the bridge that goes over the river. The ground was wet and it was foggy. The fog concealed part of the mountains. I did 2 watercolors from the bridge.
Friday night, Sept 17th, is the opening at the Dutot Museum and beginning of the silent auction.
Delaware River from the Bridge
Antoine Dutot Museum & Gallery
Presents its
Sixth Annual En Plein Air
Fine Art Show & Silent Auction
Scenes of Delaware Water Gap Painted by Local Artists
Exhibition and Silent Auction Friday, September 17th to Sunday October 3rd, 2021
