Landscape #5 ~ Cruise by Texas Daily Painter Nancy Standlee

Landscape #5 (series of 8) Contemporary Acrylic Landscapes Acrylic on paper 5" x 7"

In a previous post, I discussed these small warm ups that were done at the Robert Burridge workshop and I haven't painted since. Since I was invited to join some old college friends, Tarleton State U in Stephenville, TX to go on a Western Caribbean cruise leaving from Galveston for 7 days. It was my first cruise and what fun to be with friends and retell and embellish old stories and make some new memories. Thirteen of us had either gone there or had married someone there and one lady brought her son and he tried to keep us organized. Probably my biggest surprise is how casual the dress is. If you go wear what you have and bring about one or two dressy things. You'll never look as good as the best ones and you'll never look as bad as the worst. The food was fabulous and it was often, really 24 hours of choices, served by ninja waiters who handled a plate every two seconds. Our evening waiters were from Bali and worked 10 months and then would be off 2 months. A regret - I love personal pan pizzas and I never tried one on the ship. There wasn't time. The ship's design and decorations were an artists' dream. Rooms were named for artists, Monet, Renoir and paintings were everywhere. In the slide show below you can see one of the small tables in the theater and the table tops were small paintings and then an element from the background would be used for other decorations.

Pat, Nancy, and Peggy
We became friends our first year as freshmen at Tarleton in 1954. Peggy and I were on the annual staff together and were both in the School of Home Economics. (They don't even call it that anymore.) Pat was always winning some campus beauty contest.
There is something wrong with my shirt legs. They just don't seems to match up to mine.


Mouse over the slides for captions.

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Stephen Quiller Workshop ~ Day 3 and 4

This large sheet watercolor was painted by Stephen Quiller for the SWS meeting Wednesday night. There was standing room only to meet him and see his slides of paintings from all over the world but a lot of them were painted in his beloved Colorado. You find out very soon about his love of nature and painting the outdoors. When the snow is on the ground, then it's time for him to pick up his sketch pad and cross country ski. These works were painted flat so the students could view them in the overhead mirror but en plein air he paints vertically.


Above is a closeup of a small watercolor study of Stephen's done yesterday.One of my favorites. There is so much texture and interest with the splattering and negative painting.

Today we got into the use of acrylics and glazing. Above the first small study demo that Stephen did. Then it's our turn and I don't care to share my attempt. It's only a few steps back to your working area from the demo area and he makes it look super easy and you just know you can go back and do likewise. Well, forget that. No one paints landscapes like Stephen and I don't have the desire to paint landscapes but I wanted to study them with him. What a great opportunity with him in the area and I do breathe easier here than in his high mountain Colorado. He has made us all more color conscious and aware of landscapes many possibilities.
He began this lovely poppy study right before lunch by laying in all the orange shapes first and all I could see was candy corn and thinking when can we eat. Luscious acrylic painting. He has his own set of marks and distinctive brushwork and we practice in the air hoping to paint an aspen or poppy that looks even a little like his.
This is a watercolor of mine from yesterday. Four days of class with a late night meeting is beginning to show and I wasn't very happy with today's results.
A friend that follows my blog has asked if I'd post the 12 colors he uses for his travel palette and I will in a later post.
He's written 5 books, has his own line of watercolor and acrylics, color wheels, palettes, paper and instructional dvd's and he is a student of art history, of paints and their properties. The man knows a lot about landscape painting. He states that his 12 color palette can be taken anywhere and any color can be mixed from it and the theory of this placement goes back to the 1830's. A catalogue of his products can be ordered from his web site.

Robert Burridge Workshop ~ Cloudcroft NM ~ Thursday, Friday, Saturday

This is one of my paintings from the Robert Burridge workshop and I agree, it doesn't look like a tree or a meadow or clouds. Several of us decided to do some figures without the landscape element.
This is going to be a good day – no rain and no plein air. Today we painted on our starts and tried to finish several and watched Bob demo his “Fix Up Day” with some starts but he knows they will be abstracts. We learned about varnishing our paintings and began putting them on the wall as The Cloudcroft Art Workshops had invited other members of the Chamber of Commerce to an art opening from 6-8. Classes all summer provide instruction in every medium and what a great place this has been for energizing our art spirit and being able to paint with new friends in a beautiful setting. Bob says to be creative, you have to be incredibly positive and believe that anything is possible. I know that his class today posted some incredibly lovely paintings for the reception. I’ve posted a slide show of some of the work below. For the evening meal, we enjoyed a great Big Daddy’s special tostada and blackberry cobbler with ice cream and home to a big fire.

Friday was devoted to marketing tips and more in depth demo of negative painting. Saturday was the opening of the July Jamboree in Zenith Park with 60 artists showing their work and the sun was shining in the morning while the artists were setting up and getting ready for the day's sales. We headed home about noon and I can't attest to the rest of the weekend's weather.

The slide show below shows a sample of some of the work done in the workshop.

Robert Burridge Workshop ~ Cloudcroft, NM ~ Wednesday

No, I didn't break both legs. Read on.

This is the day destined to be our Plein Air Experience. “You paid for it. You’re going to suffer” Bob teased us while explaining the how and why for the day. He wanted it to be a pleasant experience with a simple setup and told us to try and not capture everything. He was going to demo on quarter sheets using watercolor and wanted us to consider this as a “paint sketch”. The morning got off to a great start, trudging up the highest hill in Cloudcroft already at 9,000’ and with a backpack and a folding stool; I stopped about every 5 steps and gasped for air. After our ascent to Everest, Bob decides the old stables wouldn’t do as it began a gentle mist so we headed to the boardwalk in town, scoped out the public restrooms and Bob settled down in an empty parking place surrounded by about 20 students. I’ve placed some photos in a slide show from this day below because I just found them to be so humorous. He completed one demo and the rain became more serious so we got under the boardwalk and we looked like “Make Way for Ducklings”, a Robert McCloskey children's classic, waddling along behind him with all of our rain and art gear dangling from arms, necks, and limbs. Another demo and now it was our turn. My triangle seated folding chair needed a couple more triangles but I found a table to set up some of my painting gear and began painting and nearly finished one of my better plein air paintings…not that I’ve done that many. It REALLY got serious in the rain department (later we learned it rained 3” that day). John, my table mate, and I decided to wait it out with Quiche and a latte at the Jamocha Bean . Lunch was fantastic and it only rained harder so we decided to strap on our backpacks and rain gear and head to the workshop before we missed out and looking back this was a very bad decision after rushing water engulfed both feet and lower edges of my jeans through the only route available. I squished for awhile back in class and decided to follow John’s example and go barefoot which lasted about 10 minutes until I found two plastic grocery bags in the kitchen, bagged my feet and tied the handles around my ankles and held on while I walked. I felt like an Indian with their buckskin moccasins except the plastic was a little on the thin side. Later we saw a great slide show of Bob’s work and a beautiful pear demo. I feel like I got my money’s worth plus a foot washing for the plein air experience. For the evening meal, we sat at a window table, warm and watched it rain in an elegant restaurant, Rebecca’s at the Lodge and enjoyed the fireplace back at the cabin and decorated it with wet tennis shoes and sopping wet socks. The Cloudcroft natives do call this the monsoon season.

Later I'll post some of the work done at the workshop but today it's some of the plein air photos.

Robert Burridge Workshop ~ Cloudcroft, NM ~ Tuesday

Nancy's Tree started on Tues.

People were in the acrylic class painting when I arrived at 8:30 a.m. and class begins at 9:00. Bob discussed the plans for the day, passed out his handouts and we learned more about the color wheel he has designed. It’s one thing to own a color wheel and look at it but who really studies it. Bob took the time and carefully explained his wheel and how he interprets it in painting. His tree paintings on display are fantastic and we all want to paint one and we are so ready to paint hot colorful trees using lots of oranges, reds, and yellows. He had several paintings that he had begun to demo and he will continue painting on today while teaching us his method of trees – drip trees with negative shape painting and the dab method of trees. Our first layer was done before lunch with the advice of “make a mess”. Most of us our whole life have been told “Don’t make a mess” and now we’re all grown up and Bob gives us permission to make a mess. How cool is that. I love the look of these trees and after I’ve painted about a hundred maybe I won’t have to look at my notes. It’s been interesting trying to post to my blog. The library has wifi connections but we’re next door busy painting and I never found the time to post today with so much paint and information flying in all directions. The Chamber of Commerce has free wifi and if you drive up in their parking lot you can connect but then it was time to get ready for our party tonight. I stopped at the Cabins at Cloudcroft to get help as I’d been told that some cabins could get wifi but you might have to sit on the cabin porch to connect. I got the key to log on and got on fine at the office and kept my computer on to the drive to our cabin but when I walked into the cabin I lost the signal and the owner said something about the tin roofs may prevent the signal. Anyway a few minutes ago the signal appeared on my computer that I’m connected but with a low signal. This is just all too weird as it is always a challenge to travel and try to connect to blog. I decided against sitting out in the car in the cold to post the blog. You may read it several days down the road. Seems like I can get on to write the post but it is just too slow to upload any photos so it's back to the library or the Chamber of Commerce parking lot.

One of the partners of the Cloudcroft Art Workshops owns the Burro Street Boarding House on the hill overlooking the Art Workshop and she and the rest of the partners invited the class for a pot luck dinner at 6:00. We spent the evening discussing art and getting to know our fellow students. The food was delicious. No big downpours today but a gentle sprinkle during our meal. What a beautiful privilege to paint with fellow artists during the day and share a meal in the evening. Thanks to all who made that possible.

Robert Burridge Workshop ~ Cloudcroft, NM ~ Monday

Bob's Tree Example


Bob ready to paint large and loose.


Cloudcroft Art Workshops

Robert Burridge 5 Day Workshop “The Burridge Plein Aire Experience”, June 7 - 11, 2008, Cloudcroft, New Mexico

Here we are acrylic painting in a charming mountain village and it is 9000 feet above stress level. There are about 20 students in the Cloudcroft Art Workshops, the number one workshop in New Mexico. We meet in a large room (the old study hall) of the Old Red Brick Schoolhouse that also houses the library. It rained Sunday and Monday so our outdoor plein air experience may be limited but the class is prepared to paint looser, bolder, and freer in the studio. We began that process today with Bob telling us “We all want to be better and the only way to be better is to paint a lot of bad paintings”. We discussed plans for the week, materials, warm-ups in black and white, with demos and then we were pumped and infused with confidence after being assured this was a “safe place” to be where we could paint for ourselves and our own approval. During the week we will be painting in a series, a series of “what ifs”. Bob is known for sharing information with his students and being accessible for questions. He cautioned that in a workshop setting a painter wouldn’t be doing his best work but can expect to have a couple of great paintings and lots of good starts. He assured us that this was our time as we’ve made the sacrifice to attend and he was present to help with any questions. At the end of the afternoon Bob discussed color and we began some color warm-ups. Students are escaping summer heat and enjoying Cloudcroft hospitality and the cool weather and rain. My Texas friends will find it hard to believe but we enjoyed a fire in the fireplace in our log cabin tonight. The Cloudcroft Art Workshops run classes from June to August, and each Sunday before workshops begin there is an opening reception and setup time from 6-7 p.m which removes lots of Monday morning stress of set up. Tuesday night they host a potluck social. Nice friendly folks here in Cloudcroft and several of the students are previous Burridge students, a high compliment to any instructor. This is my fourth Burridge workshop and I have 2 more planned. Kate Burridge, we miss you.