#lighthouse

Yesterday’s Lobster brought back fond memories of our Maine trip last summer. We visited as many lighthouses as we could find, which you can see in my post, The Elusive Lighthouse Photo.

On the very last day, we came across this Lighthouse, the most iconic of our trip, the Portland Head Light.

This is my first lighthouse painting, and it’s all about light and shade. Maybe I was unconsciously channeling Edward Hopper when I painted Lighthouse? Except I like his lighthouse paintings better.

This painting was a struggle. I had to stop working when the paint got too thick and too wet, something I wish I had been more careful about. For example, I wanted to darken the roof so it was brown, and I couldn’t. My most successful paintings of this Challenge were thinly painted, more like Hopper.

This time around, I laid in some of the finer details in acrylic paints. Painting wet-on-wet might have caused trouble with the juxtaposition of the dark green house trim and light walls (green bleeds easily into white and it’s hard to fix wet). I took this panel into the kitchen where I had a ready supply of water, and an open, flat counter.

It’s hard to see in the photo, but I used 3 very light washes (tints) of acrylic blue on the panel both to help the white lighthouse pop, and to prevent white hotspots (where the paint doesn’t cover). Then I painted the trim as planned. The last minute I decided to paint the roof.

Here’s where I stood when I moved out of the kitchen back into the studio.

I went with the house first to get the feeling of sunlight shining on the white walls.

Looking at this now, I realize that painting the roof in brown oil would been a better choice, skipping the acrylic underpainting. Unlike oil, I couldn’t scrape the dried acrylic paint off. Every medium has own pros and cons. The acrylic alizaron/red kept coming through no mater what I put on top of it. The sky was next to help define the lighthouse.

When I got to the bottom, I put in the greens and greys for the rocks and shrubbery, and it looked like mud on my first try. I used a paper towel to wipe the whole thing off.

Second time around, I started with a lighted yellow ochre on the rocks, with the intention of putting grey texture over that. Rocks have more color than you think, and are tricky to pain. I need to give Winslow Homer more credit for his craggy, dramatic Sprout’s Neck rocks.

I think this painting still needs work. Maybe I’ll touch things up after it’s dry. Maybe not. Once I put these little paintings down, the reality is that I rarely get back in the zone.

Do I want to borrow time from my next painting today? No.

So on to Day 19. I wonder what today will bring.