Hilltop Home
#222/365 Paintings
I’m visiting a stunning home in West Linn, OR with some super talented folks – friends of a dear screenwriter friend in Portland. This morning I played with pastels in their barn/art studio with one of their daughters. We listened to Sarah Mclachlan as she dove into the color lessons and some photographic memory exercises. She’s a realist/character painter — she enjoyed slopping around in the large world of color. Our manicures took on a whole new surface-powdered style. This is the pastel I painted of their home. We see horses, llama’s, dogs, sky and a landscape of charming homes on hills. I feel as though I’m could as easily be in Greece. So much to paint. So little time. Luckily, she and I are painting in the barn again tomorrow. We’ll focus on creating backgrounds for watercolor. I can’t wait.
That blue sky looks heavy, like it’s pressing down on that peaceful farm. Pressing down the deep, twilight blues. The farm is still bright, all the same. It’s having none of those blues. And of course that’s the very moment when, listening to the blues, you realize how bright and life-affirming those deep blues are. And the sky opens up. Not pressing down on you at all, but pulling you up into its openness instead.
And if you’re carrying some of that blue sky on your fingernails, carrying it through the day, well, all the better.
Very insightful. You have no idea how precise your thoughts are at the moment. Thank you William!
Whoa. That’s spectacular!
Ahhh, thank you so much Dale. I picked up some chalk pastels the other day to work with the 11 year old girl I’m tutoring in art and remembered how much I love them.