Weather Problems

Major weather problems made for a bad day at the Londonderry Art Fair. I was hoping that the fair would be rain delayed but the fair officials said the weather was supposed to break and the fair would go on. It was misting as I errected my tent and placed my paintings inside. I left the front off the tent because I didn't want my display to be too obscured. However before long the rains came heavy and winds blew rain into the tent and I had to put up the fourth side of the tent. Some on my paintings got wet and I was soaked. There was a bit of a break in the afternoon and a few people came by the Art Fair.

The only good thing about the day was my painting of the " Nubble Light" a lighthouse in Maine took a third place ribbon.



I had to spend the next couple of days drying out my displays, tent and had to reframe some of the glazed artwork. I wish we had gone for the rain day.

Nubble Light, limited palette

The first photo shows my Yarka, French style easel. It has aluminium legs and is lighter than the typical French easel. It's great for plein air painting. I put oven glass in the easel as a mixing surface. Even dried acrylics are easily removed by wetting the glass. The folded paper towel, at the forward edge of the palette, is wetted, excess water squeezed out, and the acrylic paint globs stay fresher longer on the wet paper.

I had a request to do a painting of the Nubble Lighthouse in Maine for my next art show. It was an opportunity to experiment with a limited palette. I used permanent red, yellow ochre, prussian blue and titanium white. It is fun to see what I can do with a limited palette. My normal palette is only five colors: cad yellow, cad red, ultramarine blue, burnt sienna and rarely permanent green (to gray things down). One of these days I'll try the Zorn Palette of black, yellow ochre and red. White is always understood, officially it's not a color. I have seen some amazing art even with this surprising palette.

This painting is also in the art auction at the Fuller Gardens.