New Landscape "Summer Afternoon"

"Summer Afternoon" (tentative title)

20"x24"

Oil on Canvas

This was officially the largest painting I've completed so far. It was painted from a photo taken one afternoon while going on a walk around the neighborhood with my wife and daughter. I saw the view and was glad we had our camera with us because I immediately wanted to paint it.

My focuses during this piece were:

1) To capture the lush green of the scene and complement that with the splash of red.

2) Convey the afternoon lighting by keeping the shadows relatively light while still dark enough to contrast with the sunlit areas.

3) To create a visual path to draw the viewer into the painting. My intended path starts at the upper left corner with the sunlit shingles, follows the brightly lit flowers over the arch, jumps to the slanted shadow on the opposite house, proceeds down to the lit bush in the bottom right and then on to the patch of sunlit grass before passing through the arch and finishing at the bright triangle on the fence.

I enjoyed painting this one immensely and am very pleased with how it turned out.