After painting the aurora this month, I went back into the archive to paint photos from September as well as several cool skies from last winter. Now that I am back in Massachusetts, it feels a lot more emotionally possible to paint my old Massachusetts photos.
Suburban Aurora
Like many in North America, I was wowed by the geomagnetic storm on the evening of October 10. After never seeing aurora on the East Coast in my life, the sky suddenly became so pink!
Why I wanted to paint this scene: Unbelievable bold pink aurora color. Juxtaposition with mundane elements. Highway leading lines.
What I like in the painting:
- Bold color
- Tree shadows
- Suggestions of power lines; the white lines especially give the idea of lit lines, even though none of them really work or are complete if you look closely
- Whites left behind for blurred streetlight. I feel like I managed to keep it pretty loose and not work too hard.
Color notes: I intended to use PR122 for the aurora color but ended up switching partway through to PV19 Quin Red as it looked rosier to me. Other colors included Indanthrone Blue, Quin Gold, TRO to dull down the blue, Hansa Yellow Deep (just for the highway stripe), and white gouache (for the stars and lit power lines).
Pastel Sunset
I used two photos from February for reference.
Why I wanted to paint this scene: Delicate pastel sunset colors contrasted with naked trees.
What I don’t like in the photos: Pastels don’t take up much of the sky, tree branches and backgrounds are too busy.
What I like in the painting: Loose, expressive, glowing sky; pastel colors; reasonably successful “blend as suggestion of tiny branches” at ends of distant trees.
Color notes: I did use a tiny bit of opera rose in the pink mix but it’s mostly Quin Coral. The yellow is my usual sunset buddy NaplesYellow Deep. Cobalt is the main sky/cloud blue color with a little PBGS to suggest cyan in the upper sky. Palette muddy greens for background.
Pastel Sunset II
Using the same color palette from the painting above, I did a second painting from another months-old snap from Danehy Park.
Why I wanted to paint this scene: The diagonal streak of pink in the clouds on the right side!
What I don’t like in the photo: Busy bottom
What I like in the painting: Loose, tie-dye-esque sky. Pastel color palette.
What I don’t like in the painting: Awkward tree especially in the outer branches.
Mackerel Sky
I took a series of photos of a cool sky in Danehy Park in January, and this is my first attempt at panting them.
What made me want to paint the scene: Cool cloud formations, glowing light behind the clouds.
What I like about the painting: In isolation, I like the painting and its wet-on-wet cloud patterns. I also like the subtle blue-gray to light apricot background color.
What I don’t like about the painting: Comparing it to the photo, I think I did too much wet-on-wet and not enough sharp detail. I also didn’t capture some of the fascinating “stripes” of clouds I originally liked.
Bellhouse Park
Why I wanted to paint this scene: This is a beautiful park near my aunt’s home in BC. In this exact snap, the colors of the clouds in the background caught my eye originally. That’s why I took the photo, though the photo doesn’t capture them exactly. They were gold-brown and violet-blue at the same time.
What I like in the painting: So much! I like how I brought out color instead of making it so dark and silhouetted like in the photo, but it’s still dark enough to look like evening. I like the colors of the clouds and how it has bits of cyan, purple, and gold; even though it’s not quite what the original is like, it’s still good. I also like how the stones on the right came out.
What I don’t like in the painting: There is a rought area under the trees where I changed the horizon line and ended up with a weird dark line.
My First Aurora
Why I wanted to paint this scene: It’s the first time I saw the aurora! From Kits Beach in Vancouver, in September of this year.
What I like in the painting: A sense of glow and movement; nighttime-level darkness which still allows for high contrast between the mountain and the sky. The mountain kisses the aurora. The tendrils of light, which are hard to do!
What I don’t like in the painting: It’s quite simplistic, which I don’t think necessarily is a problem… but it might have been nice to make it a little more complex by having two disconnected aurora “lines” instead of one, or by having more detail in the foreground (e.g. the city lights or trees).
Conclusion
I’m pretty happy with the skies I’ve painted this month. Even while clearly seeing flaws, mistakes, or areas of improvement in my work, I feel like I am painting what I want to be painting, and what I dreamed of when I first began 3.5 years ago!