Day of Painting the Brinton 1704 House

Yesterday, I was invited to paint the Brinton home built in 1704 as part of this year's Brinton Family reunion with about 150 people attending.
  There were 5 painters at different locations.  I decided to paint the back of the house with the flower garden.  About a month ago, it felt like a good idea to visit the home again and take photos of different views and decided on two that were different.   Fifteen years ago, this was the location I used for my Christmas card.  It was definitely a home that was a favorite of mine to paint.  
 So I enjoyed this opportunity to paint this home located on Oakland St. in the Dilworthtown area.  It is open for you to tour on weekends.  

Taking Time to Paint from Now Until September

I am working on a number of paintings to get ready for the art show in Media as they only allow original paintings.  So I am working on painting a number of small original flower paintings, historic sites and landscapes.  One thing I am trying to do is to try to highlight the focal point of each painting and spend less time on the details in the other areas of the paintings.

          Hanging in Starbucks in West Chester PA

This should enhance the painting visually and draw you into the painting.  Sometimes on a building, you need to include all the details, but other times it does not allow your eyes to rest.  So I will have to work on these changes.  That means some paintings will be completed but then never shown as they do not display the results I am looking for.

So keep the date of September 22nd in mind on the main street in Media that the trolley runs down.

Summer Painting

Coming up in July after getting back from our vacation, I am looking at finding a number of sites around Delaware County to paint as I have just been accepted into the Community Arts Center juried art show to be held in Media, PA September 22nd.    I can only sell original watercolors so will be busy painting new watercolors of all sizes.

One of the locations I will be working on are some historic homes in Chester county.  One will be the 1704 Brinton House.  I will also be working on over 100 of my new ideas that I will take from 100 new photos I have taken this spring.

KEY LEARNING EXPERIENCE:   After touring the Wyeth Studio in May, we recently went back in June with my wife, daughter and a guest visiting from Charlotte.  During that tour, it became apparent it would be really helpful to understand how Andrew Wyeth decided what to paint and then how he turned that idea into a painting.  He believed that you had to paint what your really were close to and knew very well.  He learned to concentrate in this way by his father - N, C, Wyeth.  So he concentrated on local homes, people , hills , trees, etc. from Chadd's Ford and the area around Rockland, Maine. As I read more about him and heard him speaking in the video - " Snow Hill", an even greater desire to learn to improve my painting and my watercolors began to grow in me.  While I will never be able to paint people like he did, my goals will be to improve my landscapes and still lifes as well as begin to paint people.