This Monday, I focused on big shapes. My demonstration was of reeds at Shollenberger Park in Petaluma, CA. I didn’t start by painting the individual stalks but saw them as big masses that needed to stay in the foreground. The trees in the back were very blue because of the atmosphere in the air that day. The water on the right was darker than the sky but still needed to be warm as it was in light. You will often here me saying to students, “No dabby-cabby-doing”, which means don’t start with little pieces but start to see the big puzzle of related shapes.
Here is a development of the start and a detail of the reeds in the middleground. I did not just copy what was in front of me but designed them.
Finished painting. Note I have included figures scale and interest.
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Here is a picture of the scene in Petaluma at Shollenberger Park. It was a beautiful, sunny day. We are all anticipating the coming Spring.
On Monday, our class focused on composition. I did three possible small sketches of the scene. The first drawing below is the first composition, followed by a color study.
Here is the second compositional drawing and color sketch.
And finally, the third compositional sketch. No sky, just the pathway and the surrounding foliage.
These were done fast and started to give me an idea of what my final painting will look like. I also suggested that my students divide their canvases into thirds (horizontally and vertically) so they would avoid having their compositions be too symmetrical; or at least, be aware of that if they were.
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We went to Shollenberger Park and the day started out gray, with a sky filled with wonderful clouds. As I was painting the gray day, the sun came out. As I suggest to all my students in these changing situations, be prepared with two panels so you can go from gray to sunny. The top painting is the finished gray day and the bottom painting is the finished sunny day study.
As you can see, the sky was filled with great cloud formations in the beginning!
The following two pictures are of the scene and the start of the gray day painting.
Second step and then the final painting, which was cleaned up and finished in my studio.
Now my sunny start and finished painting.
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I never tire of painting this Petaluma, CA location. These are three paintings of the same view. Each painted in very different light keys.
Light Key: Late Afternoon The colors are oranger than the morning light.
Light Key: Gray Day Colors are subtler.
Light Key: Early Morning Sun Colors are softer than the late afternoon light.
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Each month, I feature a painting at a special rate. The painting below is this month’s painting. Easton Landscape, 9″ x 12″ To find out the special price, go to my website: przewodek.com 
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Anatomy of a Workshop
In this post, I am going to describe what my 5-day workshop entails. At the end of the post, I list the dates of all this year’s 5-day workshops. Each day I will do a short demo of what I want you to work on that day. The following photos are all demonstrations done in a workshop.
The first two days, we start by painting simple still lives. We concentrate on organizing our lights and darks, getting an accurate drawing, and painting the difference of color between all the objects. The focus of this workshop is getting a strong start. As my husband says, “If you don’t get a good start, you’re finished.” We start by using a palette knife to apply our colors.
The third day, we go on location to a neighborhood and paint houses surrounding by foliage. As you can see, the houses are just blocks on the landscape. At this point, the student can use a palette knife or a brush. As we progress through the week, we are getting more complicated and trying to apply the simple concepts introduced in the first two days.
The fourth day, we go on location again and paint the landscape without buildings. Here we are focusing on painting the aerial perspective and the illusion of depth in a painting.
The fifth and final day, we paint the figure outdoors. We are still painting basic shapes and not getting involved in features.
Here are my current list of 5-day workshops scheduled for 2019:
Scottsdale Artists’ School April 15-19. info@ScottsdaleArtSchool.org
Petaluma, California May 13-17 Finart@sonic.net
Petaluma, California August 12-16. Fineart@sonic.net
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Mondays With Camille
This Monday, February 18, we were at the Ellis Creek Water Recycling Facility In Petaluma California. Here is a step study of my demonstration. I first cover my surface with big puzzle pieces, (the back mountain, the left hand distant trees, etc.), each being a different color and each color related to one another. The sky is the lightest as it relates to all the colors on the ground. If I have a white object in this scene, that would be the lightest and brightest color note. In this case I don’t so the sky was the lightest. This isn’t the case in the photo I took but on location the sky was the lightest.
Picture of Scene and Final Painting
First Lay In
Second Pass over where I modify the first lay in
Ta-Da – the painting finished in the studio. Painting is available at demo prices
Here are pictures of my students. As you can see, we had a beautiful, sunny day.
Some of my beginning students were working on a simple still life set up in full sun. This is a quick demo I did for my students of this still life. The white vase is the lightest shadow and the white in light is the brightest and lightest. I have painted my blue block a warm color because it is in the light. I have made sure that I have made all the light planes warm and lighter than any of the shadows planes. Please note that the mulch in the distance is in the light so I painted it a warm color.
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