83.  Original Plein Air Watercolor Painting, “Plein Air, 12:00-2:30pm, Travel Lift, Oxford, 7.14.24”, watercolor, 30 x 42”, 2024

Location: Oxford, MD

Event: Plein Air Easton

Event Awards: Grand Prize, Quick Draw; Auto-invite for Plein Air Easton 2025

This piece was a stretch for me at the time, and several different elements came together to make it possible to do.  First, it wasn’t my first painting of the day.  I’d finished a pre-sunrise painting that same morning, “Plein Air, 5:45-6:15am, Pre-Sunrise, Safe Harbor, Oxford, 7.14.24”.  Once one painting is complete for a day, I no longer feel any pressure to “have to” make something good, or make anything at all.  I had scoped out this boat travel lift on a previous day, biking around Oxford exploring potential neighborhoods and places to paint.  “That’s cool” I thought, when I saw this piece of machinery, but I had no idea if I could actually paint it.  On the day I found this scene again, what caught my attention first was the reflection in the dirty construction-water puddle beneath it.  I began there, mixing those pale chalky colors as best as I could, and then worked from bottom to top of the piece.  Also, I was in luck in terms of having shade to work in.  I had not yet purchased my giant 10 x 10 foot shade tent that is now a regular feature in my plein air practice, but at the edge of this parking lot was a cement-base lunch umbrella - perfect for my purposes.  I dragged it over to be able to have the painting in the shade.  I’d learned my lesson on another failed piece during this festival that to achieve full sunlight optical effects, it was absolutely necessary to work in the shade, otherwise the piece would come out far too dark.  The shade is for the work - not for my comfort.  This piece ended up being one of the two pieces I was allowed to enter into the official competition.  The canvas straps hanging between the blue metal superstructure were a bit of a challenge to paint - to keep the white of the paper reserved for the tops of their reflective canvas, with no underdrawing, and no use of white.  I had in mind, at some point during Plein Air Easton, my first plein air event, to show what I can do with watercolor, and this piece achieved that.  I don’t care about meeting someone else’s expectations in my work - my work chases after and tries to meet my own standards.