Sedona Architectural Plein Air Workshop with Larisa Aukon by Nancy Standlee Texas Artist

The Chapel
12x16 oil on canvas panel
 (this photo can be improved later as it was taken inside in the studio.)

This was painted in the studio on the last day, Friday, of the Larisa Aukon's Architectural Plein Air workshop in Sedona at the Sedona Art Center after a week long effort of small sketches and studies in oil outside. I found Larisa Aukon's colorful oils on the internet and wanted to take a workshop and since I'd never been to Sedona and it would be my birthday week, I signed up for the 5 day architectural plein air oil class. It is a stretch for me as I've recently began painting in oils (Jan, 2012) and I don't "do buildings" or paint plein air (and that is a fancy word for saying painting outside). I left DFW Saturday, October 27, a day early because the Sedona Arts Center had been hosting the 8th Plein Air Festival all week and plein air painters from all over the world would be showing their paintings in the gallery with an auction at 4:00. I rented a car in Phoenix, got unloaded at the Days Inn, and arrived just in time to enjoy seeing some incredible art.
The auction:
 Each artist had one work presented and set a minimum bid. The artist would come to the stage with someone else holding the painting and the auctioneer would begin. Now that takes a lot of nerve to stand in front of an audience with your painting, waiting for the first bid. Some were not bid on, but several sold  beginning at around $200 up to $2900 with profits shared between the center and the artist.
An online friend:
I received an email from Nance the week before I left saying she had been a follower of my blog and hoped we could meet someday and said she lived in Sedona and would be taking the plein air workshop. I couldn't believe it as it was the same workshop I was attending and I told her we'd meet soon enough. She met me after the auction and we went to the Javelina Cantina for good conversation and Mexican food. Nance was an incredible host for the week, introducing me to some of her favorite places to dine and answering my many questions. She has a Flickr account with some of her paintings HERE.http://www.flickr.com/photos/sedonaNan  My motel was about 5 minutes from her house and if Sugar Foot, my GPS, ever failed I could always follow her home.
Tour on Sunday:
I chose a 2 1/2 hour Sedona tour on Sunday morning and then met Nance for a quick tour of Tlaquepaque, a very interesting art and craft area. In a later post I'll tell you how to pronounce it but for the time being it was easier for me to say "Hockey Puckey".
I'm sitting in the Phoenix airport waiting for my flight back to DFW remembering what a great week the eight of us had painting plein air with Larisa. We all learned more about the perils and fun of painting outside and the weather was our friend this week as we all tried to imitate Larisa's colorful painting style.

Nance and Nancy in Jerome on Tuesday

Sedona

Larisa painting demo.

One of Larisa's paintings.

She will have a 2013 class at Scottsdale Artist School and here is her course description and you can see her supply list HERE.http://scottsdaleartschool.org/instructor/instructordetail/id/397

In the next posts I will go into more details about each days activities so stay tuned. 

TEXAS DAILY PAINTER, OIL PAINTING, ARCHITECTURAL PLEIN AIR, SEDONA, AZ,  ARTISTS OF TEXAS BLOG, NANCY STANDLEE , FINE ART,  DAILY PAINTWORKS, CONTEMPORARY FINE ARTS INTERNATIONAL, PINTEREST, LARISA AUKON WORKSHOP

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