Still One of My Favorites!

This painting is of a spot in my neighborhood overlooking Pensacola Bay. I had just seen such an incredible sunset that I stood still to watch it, immersed in a shifting sea of orange and gold that filled my entire field of vision.When I painted the scene the next day I placed it within that sunset. I painted everything else with the sharp shimmer of intense light that had surrounded everything the night before. The painting was displayed briefly a few years ago. It has been in my studio since. It's still one of my favorites and is still available.

Sunset Over the Bayou - oil on birch panel - 30x40
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On the Coast

What an amazing week on the central coast of California! It was hotter and dryer than past spring trips, so for the first time I saw the golden hillsides covered in yellow flowers and blue lupine that are in so many of the paintings by the California impressionists.
In between working on property maintenance and taking care of business, I painted. By the end of the week I had five new paintings that will need  finishing. This one was painted from an orchard in Templeton looking across neighboring ranches towards the Santa Lucia mountains.

I didn't block in the foreground because I needed to stop to think whether the painting needed the orchard trees that were actually there. It doesn't. And it doesn't need a lot of the other details that were there either. Already unfinished it has the feeling of restful peacefulness of an earlier time that I always feel when I'm in this part of California.
I found some great painting places on this trip that I didn't know about before. I also revisited Mission San Antonio de Padua. I'll be using my art to help in the preservation efforts of that mission. You can help too! More about that later. In fact, there is so much to share about this past trip, that I'm starting a special Thursday feature with posts specifically about the central coast. Please don't be shy about adding your own comments or questions!