Michael Chesley Johnson - Afternoon Delight

"Cobscook Bay Afternoon" 5x7, pastel

Now and then, when you find the stress of painting too much, you need to go visit a friend. Take your painting gear, so you can paint while you chat. There's nothing like it! While the verbal half of the mind is engaged, the artistic half can have a field day. I went out to visit my friends who were camping at Cobscook Bay, where I set up in the shade with a cool breeze and a folding chair to sit in. I chose pastel rather than oil because there's just a lot less fuss with pastel. All that, plus a glass of wine - what a perfect afternoon!

Michael Chesley Johnson
www.MichaelChesleyJohnson.com - http://mchesleyjohnson.blogspot.com

Michael Chesley Johnson - More Drizzle

I really can't complain about living in the "grey zone" here in the Canadian Maritimes.  This extended period of fog, drizzle and rain does me a favour.  The grey overcast saturates the colours, pouring rich color throughout the landscape.

I went out the other afternoon - again, between bouts of rain - and got caught.  Not as much drizzle as the day before, but enough that I could see it building up on the paint surface.  I tipped my easel forward to keep any more rain off the panel so I wouldn't  have to fight with the water.

"More Drizzle, November"

5x7, oil, en plein air

$60+$5 shipping

Michael Chesley Johnson - Looking Up

Lately, I've been enjoying painting simple pieces. I've been looking more for an abstract angle and composition. One evening, the sight of these spruces against the rich, blue sky caught my eye. I was fascinated by not just the compositional possibilities but also the color. You don't get moments like this very often!



"Looking Up" 5x7, pastel, en plein air
$60+$5 shipping

Michael Chesley Johnson - Pastel Nocturne

Although I've painted nocturnes in oil, I've never done a night painting in pastel. I thought I'd give it a try. Unlike oil painting at night, you don't have the color mixing issue. (In the glow of my headlamp, Ultramarine Blue oil paint looks a lot like Alizarin Crimson oil paint, and it's mostly because I always arrange my palette in the same way that I can tell them apart.) But you do have the color selection issue -- which is, in my mind, almost as difficult.

We had a beautiful full moon this morning, and when I woke around 4, I decided to take advantage of it. I loaded up my pastel gear and hiked down to our beach through the apple trees. The ripe apples seem even more fragrant in the night. As I moved out into a clearing, I saw Friar's Head, lying in the distance like a black slab in a silvery sea.

I set up my pastel box. I keep it well-organized. It has six sections, one for each color family. I divide each section with cool colors at one end and warm colors at the other. In addition, I sort the pastels in each section by value. With this level of organization, you'd think it'd be a piece of cake in the dark to find the correct cool, dark purple I need. Not so - there are subtle but important variations among those cool, dark purples. They were almost impossible to see under my headlamp.

I found myself looking at the scene, deciding (or guessing) what color a certain shape before me was, and then reaching into the box where I remembered that particular color should be. But was it the correct cool, dark purple? The best I could do was get right the color family, the temperature and the value. Whether it was a slightly redder purple or a slightly bluer one was hard to tell. But this isn't a problem unique to pastel; it's the same with mixing oil paint in the dark.

Unlike oil paint, however, which stays on the palette where you put it, pastel sticks don't. I have a little tray (my "working palette") that I put my pastel sticks in as I work so I can find them again easily. Well, they rolled around and got jumbled up a bit. Oops! Is this the purple or the green? I had to work very hard at keeping the pastel sticks that were in use separate.

I ended up focussing more on value than anything and tried to approximate the temperatures. Even so, I was pretty satisfied with the result. Here's the painting after a few minor tweaks in the studio:



"Friar's Head, Moonlight"
5x7, pastel, en plein air
$60+$5 shipping

www.MichaelChesleyJohnson.com

Michael Chesley Johnson - Salt Marsh Glimmer

This little painting is only 5x7, but I think it really evokes the sense of late summer here on Campobello Island in the Canadian Maritimes. A light fog tumbled in from the ocean into the salt marsh, throwing a cool light on the scene. But the grasses, which are just starting to change into their fall colors, lend a sense of warmth to the foreground. The cool light in the distance and the warm colors up front go a long way to creating an illusion of space in the painting.



"Salt Marsh Glimmer"
5x7, oil, en plein air - Michael Chesley Johnson, PSA MPAC PSNM

www.MichaelChesleyJohnson.com

Michael Chesley Johnson - East Quoddy Morning

We have three lighthouses within a few minutes of my studio. Although some artists eschew the idea of painting lighthouses as being too cute, there's a lot that can be done with them. I chose the East Quoddy Lighthouse (also known as the Head Harbour Lightstation) to do an early morning study of light on a white structure.

It's a lonely-looking lighthouse, isn't it?


"East Quoddy Morning"
5x7, oil, en plein air
$60+$5 shipping
www.MichaelChesleyJohnson.com

Canyon Resident

Betsey Nelson oil on canvas panel 5x7 $220
A chance encounter with a pack team coming out of the canyon allowed me to get some wonderful pictures for a painting. A play with color (photos never show the true colors or the true brillance of sunlight) helped me to capture the feeling of a sunny hot spring day at the Grand Canyon.