One accomplishment in particular was the completion of an agreement (a sort of challenge) that I had made with another artist/art minister back in October. You see, I was on my creative travels in Scotland at that time (if you're interested in reading more about that trip you can check out my blogposts at: www.traveling-artist.blogspot.com) I had met up with an artist from Northern Ireland when I was staying in the rainy urban metropolis of Glasgow, Scotland. We spent some time connecting about art ministry, sharing ideas and encouraging each other. At one point in our conversation we were discussing artist block (that dreadful season an artist goes through when no matter what you try you just can't seem to create anything new, you feel stuck and flatlined, it can be rather depressing actually). In an attempt to keep encouraging each other we talked about things we'd like to try to get that creativity flowing once again. And that's when we came up with the crazy idea to challenge each other to paint outside in a storm. Yep. In a storm...that means, rain, wind, snow, whatever. The point would be to use it as an experiment...to see how the weather would effect paints, canvas, brushes, etc. And could we really adapt spontaneously however the elements played with us. We put a time limit on it so we couldn't procrastinate. We agreed to meet our challenge by the end of November. He went back to Northern Ireland and I went back to Idaho. Not too far into November he met the challenge by painting out in the rain and wind near the sea. But to my surprise upon my return to the States some unfortunate circumstances and family emergencies took place back to back and kept my attention all through November and into December. And then the holidays were upon us. Time seemed to get away from me and all my creativity seemed to be drained from me and I was not able to meet our challenge in the agreed time period. But he was gracious to understand. I let him know I would accomplish the task as soon as I could. AND BAM!!! This week we had a snowstorm!!! The time had come to rise to the challenge and paint outside in a storm!!! So I grabbed my easel and paints and rushed out to my back garden (that was quickly being covered in a blanket of snow) and I set to paint a scene from my Scotland highland travels.
My brushes were quickly covered in snow. I ended up just using one brush as many of them had frozen stiff to the canvas roll up holder they were in and were unusable.
My acrylic paints were barely visible after a short while. I had thought enough to fill my water cups with hot water so they wouldn't freeze. I had to apply the hot water to the paints quite often as they were tacking up on the pallet and were becoming unworkable.
The cold was definitely effecting the water based acrylic paint. As the snow flakes hit the canvas they would immediately stick to it. This caused the paint (which was tacky once applied to the cold canvas) to bead up with the snow. It reminded me of the texture of salt I've experienced using salt with watercolors (if you apply salt to a watercolor paper that has been painted with rather wet watercolor paint, the salt reacts with the water and creates crystal like patterns.when the paint dries all the salt crystals are stuck to the paper and you brush them off to reveal the fun patterns left behind.) I was able to brush off the paint/snow beads and that left varous textures behind on the canvas.
I was outside about 45 minutes when I needed to stop. I could no longer see my paints or brushes (the snow had piled up so high and was still descending upon me). My hands (ungloved) were frozen and I could no longer paint. So I brought everything into my warm studio. I set the painting flat on a table. Within minutes the paint and snow melted and began pooling up on the canvas. I decided to work with this natural phenomenon. So I used a paper towel to soak up some of the pools and to dap to create textures. Then I lifted the painting and let some of the paint drip to give a fun waterfall effect. The above painting is the result of my painting in snowfall. I am really happy with the outcome. It's very ethereal and enigmatic, which is precisely the atmosphere I would've wanted to create for this particular subject (a highland waterfall). I can almost smell the peaty bog and feel the mist hanging in the air and hear the cold water rushing in the distance. I don't know if I could've created this without the snowfall experience. I really do think that to be an artist you have to be a bit crazy. I know this was crazy...but I'm very pleased at finally meeting this stormy challenge.
This is awesome!
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