California Oak Plein Air Landscape Oil Painting – Descanso Oak Trio
Descanso Oak Trio
8 x 10
oil
Another warm twilight evening, another chance to paint some Descanso Oaks. I picked a different view this week and did a little rearranging of the shrubberies to create a path where there was none.
You can see the work in progress below. As should be evident from the photo, which my husband took for me, the leftmost trunk is very straight in reality and I painted it that way. When I got home and put the panel in a frame, I didn’t like the effect at all … it was a like an arrow shooting right out of the frame. So I repainted the trunk to give it some bends and curves and had to use my imagination to think through how the light would wrap around the bends. I also lifted the San Gabriel Mountain range to make it peek through the distant foliage, and created a variety of patterns in the foreground which was just shredded wood bark in full shade, very drab. So even though the colors of the actual scene were rather subdued there was salsa music playing and I painted an emotional response to the scene, not a literal rendering.
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Casa Romantica San Clemente Garden Plein air California Landscape painting
SOLD
Casa Romantica Garden oil painting
San Clemente
11 x 14
oil on linen panel
Although this painting is sold, I have others.
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I have been meaning to post this painting which I painted at Casa Romantica, a beautiful old Spanish building which is now used for weddings and meetings. This was painted on Thursday of the San Clemente paint out, in late June.
This particular part of the garden is called The Butterfly Garden. Host plants like buddleia, milkweed, cosmos and many others are planted to attract the insects. A trellis is placed on the wall to the right where the caterpillars attach themselves and create their chrysalises (chrysales?) If you look at these precious ornaments very closely you can see the monarch wings in various states of metamorphosis. Among the flowers, I have suggested a number of butterflies in the garden. Can you find them all?
In the distance is the San Clemente pier, a local landmark. By the time I finished this, in the afternoon, the June gloom morning fog had burned off.
Laguna Surf – California Marine Seascape Oil Painting
Laguna Surf
8 x 10 inches
Oil on canvas
Laguna is one of my favorite painting locations and when the sun gets really low, it’s magical.
Pasadena Pops – Picnic under the Oaks – Plein Air Landscape Genre Painting at Descanso Gardens
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Picnic Under the Oaks
Plein air landscape 9 x 12 oil painting
SOLD to collectors from Pasadena, CA
Upon returning home from our Northern California trip, I had the opportunity to paint Saturday night at the Pasadena Pops at Descanso Gardens. The big oaks were just glowing in the late afternoon sun so I decided to paint the festivities from this angle instead of looking toward the stage.
The orchestra, conducted by Maestra Rachel Worby, was divine, as usual. Some highlights for me were the Edith Piaf tribute, Offenbach’s Can-Can (complete with saucy dancers) and the concluding Gershwin number, An American in Paris. Yes, it was an evening in Paris theme. As a plein air impressionist I felt right at home.
This painting was challenging not only because I was quite tired from the weeklong painting adventure up north, but because of the heat and the rapid light changes. I got most of it blocked in during the show but needed to retreat to my studio to pull it together and add the finishing touches.
Lacy Park San Marino Plein Air California Oil Painting – Fourth of July 2009
Lacy Park on the Fourth of July 2009
9 x 12 plein air painting
SOLD
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Remember that old “Chicago” song … “Saturday, in the park, I think it was the fourth of July.”
Well, this time it really was! My husband and I have gone to Lacy Park in San Marino through the years, but it’s never livelier than on the fourth when everyone turns out for picnicking and fireworks.
There was so much color and excitement everywhere I hardly knew where to begin. Finally I settled on this familiar view of the palms surrounding the big lawn. By the time we left there was hardly a patch of green grass to be seen.
For those people who stopped by to take a peek at my work in progress, here’s the finished version, soon to be signed and framed.
La Canada Angeles Crest Landscape Oil Painting – Karen Winters
“Snow on the Crest”
16 x 20 oil on canvas
This is a view into the Crescenta Canada Valley from a high road in Flintridge, near the Sacred Heart Academy. The 210 freeway can be seen on the left as it passes the upper Arroyo Seco. The mountains are the San Gabriel range. Last winter, a snowstorm left a dusting of snow on the Angeles Crest Forest. It only lasted a few days but I had the opportunity to take some early morning pictures of this rare occurrence. By the next day, most of the snow had vanished.
Now that the temperatures have reached the high 90s locally, I thought it was a good time to think about something cool.
Above San Clemente Coastal Plein Air Seascape Skyline Painting
“Above San Clemente”
8 x 10 oil
The view from Salvador Drive, high above San Clemente, about 5:30 in the evening
This painting is on exhibit at the San Clemente Art Association Gallery, until July 31.
If you are not in the area but are interested in purchasing, please write me and I will contact the gallery.
This was one of the paintings I did for the plein air paintout – at the end of a very long day painting in other locations. It portrays the silvery bay in late afternoon light from the vantage point of Salvador Drive, up Presidio, east of the city. The sun was just out of the frame, and I was trying to keep it under the brim of my hat – not easy! My husband took this picture of the painting on the easel at the end, just as the sky was starting to turn warmish. I thought it looked kind of neat backlit by the sun.
More of my work from the paint out will be posted all this week, so please check back.
Painting a kildeer from life in Dana Point California – oil painting study
Kildeer on ground nest – plein air painting
“6 x 8” oil on canvas board
The paintout continues in San Clemente. Today, I had a rare opportunity, very unexpected, to do an oil painting of a bird from life. We were walking along a bluff in Dana Point and suddenly saw a kildeer guarding its nest – only a few feet from where we were walking. The brave little bird stood its ground even though we were very close. I found a place to sit down about 6 feet away and my husband brought me a small 6 x 8 inch canvas panel and a palette and my plein air bag. I didn’t want to take the risk of standing up at an easel and scaring it – and besides, I was closer to it on the ground. For more than an hour the bird sat motionless except to occasionally turn its head. Eventually it stood up and called to its mate for a break. It is a kildeer behavior to take turns incubating the eggs. I have never had the privilege of painting a wild animal (not caged) from life before and hope that sometime it will happen again. Although the eggs were completely under the bird, I took the liberty of showing one partly exposed. They are speckled black and gray and blend in perfectly with the rocky sandy ground where they are laid in a shallow depression.
I won’t be entering this painting in the San Clemente competition although I will have it for sale in my booth. I doubt that anyone would believe it was “plein air” – imagine a bird sitting still for an hour. And yet, it happened!
Fallbrook Ranch Afternoon
“Meanwhile, back at the ranch”
10 x 12 oil
plein air painting of a ranch in Fallbrook, California
Late afternoon light casts long shadows across the pasture of this peaceful ranch in Fallbrook, California. When I was there painting, the peepers had already started their songs in the nearby irrigation canals. Spring grasses have turned to summer gold, perfect for grazing.
This weekend, June 27-28, I’ll be at the San Clemente Art Association Annual Show and Sale on the lawn by the community center. Dozens and dozens of plein air painters will be there, so I hope you can stop by if you live in that vicinity.
Yellow Ribbon -Plein Air Homecoming Oil Painting – San Clemente
“Until You Come Home”
9 x 12
oil on panel
This was the painting that I did for the QuickDraw phase of the San Clemente Art Association annual paintout. A quick draw is a timed competition – from the stamping of panels to the final horn, we had exactly 3 hours to get to a location, paint a painting, get back and frame the painting and turn it in. It may sound like a lot of time but when you take off travel time and setting up an easel and packing up, the time really flies.
The weather has been very gray in San Clemente (think: June gloom) and it hadn’t burned off by 12:30, the start time. With this in mind, I looked for something to paint the day before that would have a spot of color. When I saw this yellow ribbon hung on the balcony of an apartment building, I made it my choice. San Clemente borders Camp Pendleton, the Marine Corps base, so I’m guessing that someone who lives in that apartment has a loved one in the service, and the yellow ribbon represents waiting for their safe return from overseas. The apartment is on the corner of Santa Barbara and Del Mar, if anyone knows who lives there. The painting is currently hanging in the San Clemente Art Gallery in the Community Center. If no one takes it home before Friday, it will be in my booth for the Saturday-Sunday show.
I am continuing to paint in San Clemente and Orange and San Diego counties for the rest of the event. I’ve got three additional paintings finished, and more to come by the end of the week.
