Lavender Textures - 1 of 2

Lavender Textures- 1 of 2__6x8 oil on linen panel___$150 or $285 for pair!

Last week I stopped by the lavender farm at Becker Vineyard in Texas. THIS time I brought my camera and snapped a few pics before going to paint a demo for Die Kuenstler (Art Association). It is late in the season...a season with NO rain, so there was NO PURPLE to speak of. This color is all imaginary. I painted two studies from my photos, because I mixed a lot of color at the demo and was able to use the "demo sky purples" in the lavender bushes. This is the first of the two....it so happens that the paintings are VERY similar and actually seem to be a continuation of the same scene. If you get my group mail, I have shown the two works together....even the perspective works right....

I will post #2 tomorrow...but e-mail me if you want to see them side by side....they make a nice "pairing"

**YOU ARE INVITED!...FRIDAY, May 13 I will give a gallery talk in Smithville, TX at a reception for the opening of an exhibit. Thirty of my Farm paintings are there, for a month-long exhibit we call "Missing the Farm". Come, if you can! Stay till Saturday for a special one-day workshop. E-mail me for info vvaughan8@yahoo.com

Lavender Layers

Lavender Layers__6x8 oil on linen panel___$150 wet!! ...sketch included

Yesterday's post was a painting at this same location, the lavender fields at Becker Vineyards in Fredericksburg, TX. Just as this is not a banner year for our bluebonnets, it looks like the lavender crop might be sparse, too. But then, maybe lavender plants peak later in the spring....for now, the plants are not very big or lush, but I like the scruffy colors in the foliage with just hints of blooming flower. Sometimes a BEAUTIFUL, thick growth of blooms can look too "fantastic" in a painting...bordering on "cartoonish"...like yesterday, I painted this from my sketch, (below). See the difference in composition?

Deere in the Lavender

Deere in the Lavender__6x8 oil on linen panel___$150 wet! (sketch is included)

Does two years in a row count as a "tradition"? I say "YES", and my friend, artist Pat Haberman and I have a tradition to go out and paint the bluebonnets on my birthday....OK, so my birthday was LAST WEEK (but we were both busy)....and there were only 17 bluebonnets in the Hill Country this year (a terrible contrast to last year's bumper crop)....so we went to the Lavender farm at Becker Vineyard... (OK, so it's too early for the lavender, but NOT BY MUCH!)...AND, it was too windy to get out the full plein air gear, so I sketched this (see below), and went home to paint it from my notes....more and more often along my Plains journey, I am finding myself very comfortable painting from memory...there's something nice about being able to "make it up", and my many years of plein air study has given me some understanding about light and color...So, I painted the one above, working only from this sketch, because I forgot to bring my camera...The paper is wrinkly because I had a death grip on it because it was so windy!