Old Adobe, Canyon Road, Santa Fe, NM

24 x 36 inches, oil on canvas ©Ann Painter

 

Hillside Casa del Sol, Ghost Ranch 20

8 x 8 inches, oil on panel, © Ann Painter 2011

Actually painting "en plein air" is exhilarating and challenging. August in Northern New Mexico is hot. Cloudy skies come and go, the light changes constantly and the gnats and mosquitoes can be maddening. If you find a shady spot to paint from, the sun moves and you are suddenly in the bright sun, or that perfect spot turns out to have cactus thorns or an ant hill right where you are sitting. 

Lots of painters work in their comfortable studio from photographs. Their only "plein air" experience is to go out into the landscape and take the photos they paint from. I noticed some time ago, when I was out doing this kind of non-painting, that the camera distorted the size and relationship of the shapes I was photographing. So if Pedernal appeared large to my eye, it appeared small in the photo I took of the same scene. I realized that if I didn't capture the images as I saw them with my eye, the painting I created would have very little relationship to what inspired me in the first place. So, I slather on bug-off, wrap my neck in a wet scarf, cover my ears with a bandanna, my head with a hat and my arms and legs with long clothing, and sit in the landscape until I have what I want or at least, a good start.

This painting of a hill opposite Casa del Sol, beneath the Puerto del Sol chimney at Ghost Ranch was a challenge for all the reasons noted above and more. I couldn't seem to "get it" and must have wiped the start of a painting off the board 3 times before I decided to slow down and take it piece by piece. I drew with a pencil and then painted, drew again and painted again. The colors were soft and subtle and I decided to stay closer to what I saw than I usually do, and include more of the textural detail. At a certain point, I stopped looking at the actual subject and began painting what I remembered and felt about it. This is my favorite part...the place where I let go of the "out there" to paint the "in here". This painting felt like a turning point and is, to date, one of my favorite paintings in the Ghost Ranch series.

Ghost House Interior, Ghost Ranch 19

 6" x 6 inches, oil on panel, © Ann Painter, 2011

SOLD

On rainy or cold days, I often take students inside Ghost House to paint from the interior of this old adobe building that housed early visitors to the Ranch. Built by hand in 1886, the building has been restored to retain the original character or the structure. There are stories of cattle rustlers, hangings in the huge cottonwood tree out front and ghosts that continue to haunt the place to this day.  The warm adobe walls change color all day long, depending on light, time of day and weather conditions. The interior of the building is lit by daylight streaming through the small original windows built into the the thick adobe walls.  It is this light and the glow it created that inspired this painting of chairs and table in the main room. This commissioned painting was created as a companion piece for the earlier Ghost House Exterior, Ghost Ranch 13.  

Green Chair and Kiva, Ghost Ranch 18

6 x 6 inches, oil on panel, © Ann Painter 2011

The shape of the kiva fireplace that is traditional to adobe architecture is very organic. Kivas were made of the same adobe mud as the walls of the house. Many were quite small but able, with very little wood, to warm the whole room in winter. Unfortunately, the kivas that still exist in Ghost House, are decorative rather than functional. I understand the reasons for this but none-the-less, find it disappointing, especially on cold days when fire would make painting in this room so much more comfortable. In this painting, I was interested in the contrast between the soft shapes of the kiva and the hard, linear shapes of the chair and space behind it. The glow on the interior wall came from warm afternoon light that steamed in through the window on the opposite wall.

Ghost House Interior, Ghost Ranch 19

 6" x 6 inches, oil on panel, © Ann Painter, 2011

SOLD

On rainy or cold days, I often take students inside Ghost House to paint from the interior of this old adobe building that housed early visitors to the Ranch. Built by hand in 1886, the building has been restored to retain the original character or the structure. There are stories of cattle rustlers, hangings in the huge cottonwood tree out front and ghosts that continue to haunt the place to this day.  The warm adobe walls change color all day long, depending on light, time of day and weather conditions. The interior of the building is lit by daylight streaming through the small original windows built into the the thick adobe walls.  It is this light and the glow it created that inspired this painting of chairs and table in the main room. This commissioned painting was created as a companion piece for the earlier Ghost House Exterior, Ghost Ranch 13.