A Landscape artist making art, in 2022
6 May 2022
Paint, paint, paint and then, paint some more
Relaunching this website
At the moment I'm neglecting this website badly, I'm sorry. I started sorting it out, got well in to it, and then became obsessed with painting outdoors. I think of nothing else, and the project of relaunching this website has faded into the background for the time being.
What 2022 is all about
I've spent the last couple of years feeling something was wrong in my art practice. Covid and lockdowns didn't help here of course…
I couldn't figure out what was wrong to begin with, because things had developed gradually.
An unhealthy drift
I'd drifted into working in the studio more and more. Making linocut prints demands a lot of time in the studio you see.
When I realised I'd not even sketched outside for an age, I had to fix it, and put everything else aside. It was a priority. Why? Well…
What inspires my art
I've never copied photographs, or used them to any great degree while making my art.
It's my outdoor sketches and paintings that inspire and inform all my studio work (linocut prints and studio paintings).
Without direct observations in scribbles in sketchbooks, in mixed media splashes, in oil paint scratchings, and the experience of being there in the landscape, my other art doesn't happen.
There's a fine balance between outdoor work and indoor (studio) work that creates my art. Without that balance, my studio art dies, basically. This is why it's important to fix it.
Pushing the pendulum too far in order to find the middle
So painting outdoors has become my obsession, it's fair to say. I watch the weather forecast continually, it's like a ritual, and jump in the car filled with an insane excitement when calm and dry weather is promised.
Yes, I did say it's an insane excitement.
As I write, I've made 55 outdoor paintings since the beginning of 2022. That's an average of just over three a week.
It might not sound a lot, except it includes January and February. The short days of January brought sub-zero wind chill regardless of sunshine.
From the last week in January, through February, umpteen storms arrived almost one after the other. Wind, not rain, is an outdoor artist's nemesis, and it meant painting outside was a no-go for almost all of February.
Be fanatical, paint like a nutter
*
I dashed out in what I hoped was a lull, as Eunice approached, the worst storm of 2022. Stubbornly, I set up and painted while my easel shifted several inches in the 30mph plus wind gusts. That was interesting!
The days were short and cold, when not windy. I often only made one painting before returning home chilled to my core, needing to hug a hot water bottle for several hours to get warm.
* The UK's superstar Plein‑air artist, Peter Brown (Pete The Street) advises artists to be fanatical, paint like a nutter
if they want to improve their outdoor art. Given the above adventures, perhaps I qualify?
I managed to win a Plein‑air painting prize while obsessively snatching opportunities to paint – a complete bonus (see my instagram reel @lynneroebuck)
Better weather, easy days
The longer and warmer days as the year struggles in to summer, the more paintings I'm doing each session. Last week, I completed six paintings. Happy days! Bring it on.
I'm now spending hardly any time in my studio. This is as bad as spending hardly any time outside. The end goal is something in the middle, and I've complete faith it's where I'll settle.
