Monday, April 28, 2008

A challenge

Hidden
9 x 12 soft pastels on Art Spectrum Colourfix
Miki Willa
On Sunday, I went through my files looking for reference photos I still wanted to paint. It seems I came up with some real challenges. Either the photos were taken on really horrid weather days, or the subjects are just plain difficult to paint. I decided to start off with a difficult subject matter.
On our wonderful Kauai trip, as we were hiking along the coast, we came to a place where there was a hole in the cliffs that opened to the sea below. Tom and I both took photos. I have looked at and rejected these photos for a long time. Yesterday, this one appealed to me. The challenge, of course, is to show the depth. I don't think I totally accomplished that, but I am coming along. I do feel there is a sense of depth, but I think it was deeper in real life. There is a serious problem at the lower left from the viewers point of view. I think I need to darken this to emphasize the shadows at the depth. Another problem is the wave foam above the rock formations. The surf was very big that day, and the waves broke big, but I think it distracts from the height of the rocks.
What I am happy about is that I feel I captured the feeling of the place. I will have to work on this again some day.

2 comments:

Tom Willa said...

Visually this painting is captivationg. I imagine the ref. photos would be lacking. I guess I agree about the outside break being a distraction, Maybe losing it might be a possibility or adding a second one up a little bit.
I find you have painted a compliment to the beauty of this spot.
Nobody would believe the little sand signals errupting along the trail create by the waves and the fissure in rock formaion,either.

virtualjourney said...

Like the dramatic effect of this.

It's just occurred to me that it would be interesting to see the original you worked from sometimes to get an idea of how you've developed the the painting.