When I decided to bring my art stuff on our trip, I knew exactly where I would go for one of my paintings:
This is the view from the Pittock Mansion in the West Hills of Portland. You can see like, four different mountains from the West Hills, but one of the most spectacular views is this one over the city with pristine Mt. Hood in the background.
If you paint Oregon, your hands are going to get green.
Anyway, I worked on this for about an hour. I'm starting to see that while I can paint for long periods of time in a studio setting, an hour is the right amount of time for painting outdoors without an easel.
The mountain was veiled in clouds, so I had to fudge that part. I felt sort of guilty and considered painting exactly what was there, but then I just made like two strokes and it was there and I decided to leave it.
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| Mt. Hood from Pittock Mansion, oil on canvas board, 9"x12" |
I was nervous that the city in the middle ground didn't provide much in the way of interest, but as soon as I was finished I stepped back and liked it a LOT. There's probably too much going on in the middle-right-ish of the painting, where city buildings turn into wildflowers - not enough distinction. I'll change that. Everything else is great, which is good, because this one is for me. I need more Oregon paintings in my life.
