"No Hands Bridge" 11" x 14" (SOLD)
This is the plein air piece I painted on the Monday after Mother's day up in Auburn California. I had finished the workshop at the Box R Ranch in Oregon, and had started back home planning on stopping at Frank Ordaz's home for a visit and a day of painting, but instead of busting in on their Mother's Day, I spent Sunday traveling slowly south, and even stopping to do another Plein Air piece that was auctioned off last week, of a stream flowing from Mt. Shasta.
This is a pedestrian bridge today. I'm not real sure of it's history but I'm sure it's been there for a long time. Both Frank and Craig Stephens painted with me that day and Franks youngest son Dave helped us locate the bushes of poison oak. I was still waiting for my bout of poison ivy to clear up. Little did I know I had at least another week of dealing with it. Click on the image for a larger view.
Labels: No Hands Bridge, oil paiting, plein air painting
posted by mick mcginty at 8:00 PM
6 Comments:
It's cool to see your version of this - Frank has posted many of his. I especially like your composition. The river and diagonal lines of the banks all point to the center pylon of the bridge. My eye then travels up the pylon to the bridge, across it, and back down. A neat sort of circular view.
Thanks Jeremy. I blocked in a few compositions in my mind and using my hands to see where my edges were going to be for this horizontal composition, and it's always a question of how much to leave in, or how much h to leave out. The lines within the composition were a product of where I was standing. I didn't manipulate any of those. If anything, my drawing was just off if the lines did anything except for where I thought they literally landed. Matter of fact, the bridge itself is drawn as correctly as I could, the only problem is that it's about 30% larger than it should be for where the canyon walls are all proportionate to each other. I didn't intend it. It just happened and it looks okay here, but if you were comparing it to a photo from where I was sitting, it would jump out at you as being too large. (the bridge).
Thanks for the comment.
Mick, I cannot believe you painted this bridge scene with no hands!! What?... your feet? Sorry about that. It's a lovely painting, and I'm well acquainted with the bridge from a commission several years ago. You are a fine painter, indeed.
Thanks david. The best part about this painting was being able to paint it with two other painting buddies. It's a great motivator to have others that paint better that you can learn from instead of going out and struggling by yourself. I need to find some painting groups in the Phoenix area.
Wow Mick, That came out nice! I like how the bridge looks a bit larger. To me it gives the viewer just a hint of that sense of vertigo that I used to get as a kid when we would play around on this thing. Of course that was way before it was defiled with hand rails!:-)
Nice painting, Mick. I have painted this bridge before and walked all over it when I was a kid growing up in Auburn.
Post a Comment
<< Home