Watercolors en plein air

Monocacy Battlefield looking south.
10"X14"

Last summer I was able to work on a number of watercolor sketches. The sketches are from visits to Antietam and Monocacy, Civil War battlefields in Maryland. I was fascinated with a number of aspects of working in the open air. First was trying to reconcile what I was putting down on paper as appose to what I was seeing. I believe that one must train hard to be able to observe a scene and accurately transpose it to paper. It is a very mechanical process but I found out that I was quite rusty! It becomes a matter of creating a visual shorthand where one can quickly translate the elements of sight on to a flat page. The boundaries of the page become the frame of the actual scene, but in a more fluid way than using a camera. Another observation was I found the page size dictated the scale that I painted in. In other words I tended to paint objects a certain size so as to get a given scene to fit on a page.
Another element that I need to work out is color. I found it rater difficult to work out proper color relationships between what I was seeing and what I could mix with my watercolors. Green was a particularly hard color to work with.
I hope to make some more studies this spring before there is to much vegetation, bugs, & heat.
Enjoy.

View looking North East Antietam Md.
10"X14"
I was siting on the New York monument near the visitors center. This is one of the highest points. This was the location of a Confederate artillery battery during the morning phase of the battle. In the distance you can see South Mountain. The land drops away down to the sunken lane and Roulette's Farm.
View looking North West Antietam Md
10"X14"
This is from the same New York Monument as above. I changed my angle looking north. This part of the battlefield saw the most action in the morning. In the distance you can see the cornfield where most of the action took place. Also you can see the Smoketown road cutting across to the East Woods.
Hill in front of the Sunken Lane, Antietam MD
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This is the hill that the New York Irish brigade appeared over and slugged it out with Confederate units holding the lane.
Sunken Lane, Antietam MD
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View looking up the lane. I did not draw in the observation tower at the far end of the lane.

Two Views of the Corn Field Antietam MD.
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The View is from the road looking North across the battlefield.

Civil War Small Works

Ridgeline, McPherson’s Farm, Gettysburg
09/20/09
Ink Jet Print, Earth, Gouache
5” X 15.5”

This image depicts the ridgeline on McPherson’s Farm looking south. Native soil taken from the area outlines the slight rise in the ground. It was along this rise that the Union forces first met the Confederate forces coming in from the West starting the battle of Gettysburg.

The photographs that I am working with are from my collection that I have taken during visits to Civil War battlefields. I photograph vistas from vantage points that best capture the monumental movements of both nature and armies. The images feature sweeping scenes of vast desolate open spaces that vanish into the distant horizon. The compositional elements are open fields, tree lines, fences and sky. Strong perspective lines draw the eye in, enhancing the feeling of vastness in the scene.
I create a panoramic image by standing in one place and panning the camera to capture the horizontal landscape. The images are stitched together using Photoshop software creating a wide horizontal field of view. I then print on watercolor paper using an ink jet printer.

After the images are mounted on a rigid surface, I work over them with various water-based media & the collected earth pigment. The over-painting process smears & smudges the underlying ink jet print. This creates an interaction between the paint and the print. When painted, the printed blacks & grays morph into soft blues & greens with unexpected halo-like effects around the edges. Colored gouache mixes with the ink, softening the hard edges of the printed image. The paint texture is translucent and allows the underlying forms and structure to show through.

View of Thomas’ Farm, Monocacy MD. Battlefield
09/09
Ink Jet Print, Earth, Gouache
5” X 13.5”

View looking West at the Thomas Farm in Monocacy, Maryland. On the fields depicted, the Union army held up a confederate advance long enough to save Washington D.C. Local native soil was used to depict the contour of the land.

In my painting I welcome elements of randomness, chance, and chaos. The media undergoes transformation on the picture surface itself. Paints are applied to the surface in a pure form and then mix and morph on the surface of the painting. For example I work a lot with iron powder which can be made to rust over time resulting in rich unexpected color details and texture. The addition of soil creates flat neutral blocks of earth tones that can obscure the underlying space or enhance the perspective.
Best Farm, Monocacy Battlefield
09/09
Ink Jet Print, Earth, Gouache
6.6” X 13”
View looking south to the Monocacy River from the Confederate line. Local earth is used to describe the landscape.

Copse of Trees, Route of Advance, Gettysburg
09/09
Ink Jet Print, Rust, Gouache, Earth
7.5” X 15.5”
View from the starting point of the Confederate attack known as Pickett’s Charge. The copse of trees visible on the horizon was the target of the charge.