Sunday, September 09, 2007

Chicago Art Institute- Lion...Nocturne Plein Air Oil Painting

Well...four hours of sleep Friday night got my wife and I off
to a slow start to drive down Saturday, not getting to my son's
place until about supper time. After eating...he wanted to go
paint plein air. Getting dark, we first walked about eight blocks
to a Walgreens and we bought several clip on lights for our hats.

I wanted at first to paint on Wilson Ave about a half-block from
a McDonalds, the arches a cool urban light against a backdrop
of a building and interesting evening glow. Turns out the
neighborhood had a number of shootings this past week...could
well be initiation activity of gang members choosing the homeless
for targets. Didn't take too much for my son to talk me out of
that area! :eek: :D

So...we hopped the famour "L-train" around 9-9:30 pm...and set
up in front of the Chicago Art Institute. I was quite caught up with
the light hitting one of the famous lion sculptures that grace the
steps leading up to the art museum, and the lights of cars,
sidewalk lights and such. We painted until about 1am...drawing
a surprising attention to ourselves. At least twice, we had people
asking my son and I if we were in a race...or racing?
Strangest question!

Here was my effort, a 9"x 12" oil...


















Original- SOLD!
Buy a giclee print of this work at Imagekind!

Click on the image to see a larger more satisfying view!

I chose a split-complementary palette of a yellow-orange
(as my dominant)...with violet and blue as my split-comps, plus
black and white. Yep...that's right, for this one I told my son to
bring along a tube of black paint in case I opted to use some.

I toned my birch panel a yellow-orange to start.

Took us about 25-30 minutes for the L-train to get us
downtown...but took about 1 hr and 40 minutes to ride it
back to my son's area. We couldn't believe how slow it was
going back...as if we weren't tired enough! Got to bed
around 3am...

My wife and I drove down for one grand daughter's birthday,
turning four...and the grand daughter/baby getting dedicated
in church. That meant about 3-1/2 hours of sleep. So...driving
about seven hours home wasn't the easiest!!!

Had a lot of fun though. I could really get into painting urban
scenes around Chicago at night. The glow, colors were quite
fascinating. More than enough city adventure for this northwoods
boy!!!

:)


Larry

2 comments:

James said...

Nice. The nocturne gives great chances for contrast. Did Jason paint too? I hope he puts something up so you can link to it. I always enjoy side by side plein air pairs!

Larry Seiler said...

Thanks James...it was fun, and yep...Jason painted too...he'll probably soon be posting his effort on his blogspot. I hope...a neat piece!