Open Water

A few years ago we had a perfectly wet Spring. For three weekends in a row we got over a foot of snow, with abundant sunshine between storms. It gave me lots of opportunity to go out back to paint and to take photos. This is our creek, named Muddy Creek, and it flows in and out of our backyard. It's a wonderful source of inspiration under certain conditions. Heavy Spring snow is one of them, but it doesn't happen all that often.

I painted a small pastel study of this scene back then and it's hung on my living room wall since then. I knew I wanted to paint a larger version in oil, but also needed to decide how to handle the right side of the painting, as in the original it was a large area of not much interest. We have a section that always is open except for the coldest of times. After some thought, I decided to combine that section with my study. 

I wanted to keep the paint fresh and lively as it was in my pastel study. Using a palette knife gives lots of texture and interesting nuances. It also keeps me from getting too "tight" with my details. The warm light of the sun bouncing off the upright snowbanks and the saturated ice colors are a combination that only happens at just the right moment. It's something fleeting and short lived. I was thrilled to find the creek looking this way. The open water tumbles along pushing against the ice.