Day 3, copy after George Caleb Bingham, "Cottage Scenery"

I almost didn't go to the National Gallery today. I'm retired, so my mornings are normally relaxed. I wake up when I'm ready to wake up. On National Gallery days, however, I have to get up early if I want to catch the last commuter train or bus. Either that, or drive to the Metro, which runs all day, but the whole trip takes much longer. So I usually force myself to get up early one day of the week. Last night, however, I couldn't fall asleep, probably because I knew I had to get up early. My alarm was set for 6 am. Still awake at 12:30, I decided to unset my alarm and not go in. Disappointing, but I didn't want to be exhausted all day.

I woke up at 8:30, having had almost 6 hours, and decided it was enough - I would drive to the Metro station and go in late. I got to the NGA a little after 11 and painted from 11:30-1 before I had to break for lunch. (I was thinking I'd just work through lunch, but being sleep-deprived also makes you hungry, so I obeyed my hunger.)

During this 1 1/2 hours of painting, I repainted the sky - the cloudy part. My clouds were too violet, and his has more yellow. I mixed a color that seemed better and repainted those clouds. I also darkened the trees to the left of the house, and worked on the roof. 

These photos are how it looked at 1:00 when I went to lunch, thinking I would work more after I ate. But when I got back to my easel after lunch, I decided I just didn't have it in me to paint any more today. 

One museum visitor told me he thought my clouds were too gray. The original's clouds definitely look pinker in the photo. The art on the walls have spotlights on them, and my painting is lit by the skylight in the ceiling of the gallery, so they look different when photographed by the iPhone. I'll see what I think next week when I can look at it with fresher eyes.

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Day 2, "Cottage Scenery" by George Caleb Bingham

Today I concentrated on value - making sure my copy was light enough in the light areas without getting chalky, and dark enough in the darks. These areas get developed together, because having dark enough darks make light areas lighter. So I repainted the darks of the trees, molding the fence by doing so, and repainted the fence to try to get the color closer. The original painting has a lot of very similar colors and values, that only differ slightly, maybe in temperature. As I painted, refining the color, I also refined some detail. I'm doing this gradually. I haven't put the details of the tree branches in yet, because I feel they should be put in over dry paint. I didn't repaint the sky today. I worked on the fence, the house and roof, and the ground. 

Of course, my painting is much brighter than the original. I guess if I really wanted to, I could try to match the paler, more muted colors that Bingham used. But I kind of like the brighter colors. (People are always telling me that they like my colors better! 😉)

Here is the painting at the end of the morning, and again after lunch. I only worked about an hour after lunch and decided to stop early so I could catch the 3:28 train, which takes 15 minutes to walk to. 

Next time, I'll repaint the sky and start to address the details of the light tree limbs and the distant trees and landscape. So I don't think I'll be too much longer on this one!

Click on the images for a larger view