OK, here we go. We’re settled in, I’m meeting new maybe-friends, and joy of joys, only two boxes are left to unpack! It’s time to talk art!

The single biggest difference from Nevada to Massachusetts is the trees. There must be 400 different kinds in any square mile. That’s a lot of greens. It’s like Ireland or Great Britain: if you want to paint outside, you’d better learn your greens.

My friend and student Marcy passed on a workshop tip to us one day last year. Change color every half inch. That means your greens, too. Mix’ em, match ‘em, shift ‘em. It makes a huge difference

In this start, there are some patches of yellow-green that are pretty solid. Not to worry. I wanted them for a good, glowing base to help delineate shapes and guide the eye. I’ll be glazing over some of them later.

The rest of the painting already echoes Marcy’s advice. When I go in for the finish, large areas will remain as they are because they are a good value, they “say” trees, and they already have a good variety of greens to interest the eye.

Now you try it. Until next time,
Kate