"Outdoor Cathedral"

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"Trees can form an outdoor cathedral." I have often heard people say that they feel the presence of God even more when they are outdoors. Trees, especially large ones can definitely feel like an outdoor cathedral. It's a comforting thought.

In this piece, the stately evergreens stand in stark contrast to trees that have fully turned. Capturing that with a palette knife in a 6" x 6" space was a challenge. This is a "wet into wet" technique so it is very important to have a good strategy on which color to lay down first. My plan generally begins by thinking of the piece in layers.

Whatever appears to have the most distance from my view is what I lay down first. In addition to that strategy, I also lay down a color that will reappear if I remove some of the paint. In the case of these trees, I laid down the color of the tree trunk so that this color would reappear when I scraped back some of the additional layers. It's all very risky, but well worth the effort.

One other very important factor is realizing that only one stroke can be made before wiping off the palette knife and making another stroke. The wonderful part of this is that palette knives are much easier to clean than brushes.

Last, but definitely not least is the amount of passion brought to this process. It is well worth the effort to take care in choosing what to paint because the passion will help you bring your best effort to the painting of the piece. And if you get off to a bad start, then scrape off the panel and begin again. I guarantee you will learn something with every single piece. And there you have it...just a few more things to think about.