Sunset, Tuesday, 26 May 2009

Stony Point, Albemarle County, Va. Oil on paper, 16 x 20.For the first time in my blogging life I’ll be traveling, tomorrow through Saturday, and decided that, at least for this first trip, hauling everything – easel, paint, palette, rags, dropcloth AND camera, tripod, lights, etc., etc. – and painting, shooting and posting from a hotel room and somehow doing this without putting unsolicited clouds and sunlight on the nice wallpaper – is probably a bit much. So I will be writing here – albeit somewhat more erratically, as we’re also celebrating Laura’s birthday – and, if possible, posting whatever photos of sketches or other artifacts of the trip I can rustle up to stand in for the paintings until they finally go up on Sunday the 31st. Look for sunsets from [name withheld because Laura doesn’t know].

Depending on where you live, calling a dip in the temperature from the 80s to the upper 50s a touch of  ‘winter’ may seem laughable, but, as you may know, I’ve been on the lookout for something we might call blackberry winter. We have something like it, even if it’s only been since around noon and it’ll probably be gone tomorrow. When the rain and wind blow through the windows you’d been opening for relief from the heat and you feel like starting a little fire in the woodstove, that’s good enough for me.

But I was noticing yesterday, when I was out with Flint, that half of the blackberry blossoms have fallen off and given way to the developing green berries. I need to come up with whatever blooms right after. So I give you the false winter of the wild rose.