Industrial Marker Sketch Watercolor 2

Industrial Plain 2
watercolor on paper
5½" x 8" (13.97cm x 20.32cm)

This one like the previous post is from this post.
I mentioned I generally do the watercolor the same value or light/dark pattern as the marker sketch which is generally true. But this one I wanted a little more separation between the fore-middle-backgrounds so I did not darken the middle ground, the two fences, as dark as the foreground to distance them from the foreground and let the building fall back into the background by keeping it lighter. The middle ground has more terrain to it than it does in the marker version due to the taller format.

This is one reason for the marker sketch which serves as a way of trying out a composition and not just the notan. With that in mind I don't mind these kinds of changes. The decision I had to make was where to put the extra space. Do I add to each F-M-B ground, two of them or one? I chose the middle ground. I like the squeeze of the sky and the relative size of the foreground so it all went to the mid-ground. It opened up the composition and put a little more distance between the fore and mid-ground.506

Industrial Marker Sketch Watercolor 1

Industrial Plain 1
watercolor on paper
5½" x 8" (13.97cm x 20.32cm)

Here is another small watercolor from one of my marker sketches from this post.
I have had a lot of fun painting these in watercolor from the marker sketches. You can see some slight differences from the sketch with part of that resulting from a different size proportion but I generally maintain the original light and dark value pattern or notan.505

New Work Cityscape at Laguna Art-A-Fair

"Old LA 1"    SOLD
oil on board, 2016
6" x 8" (15.24cm x 20.32cm)

You can always find the mix of the old and the modern in the city.
It is endlessly fascinating, richly layered and textured from time.

I left out quite a bit from the actual location, which was far busier, like wires, clutter on the left sidewalk and a huge railroad crossing signal in the background. Instead I focused more on the vertical strip compressed between the power pole and building with all the intricacies of the fire escape, the hint of the yellow sign, the AC unit hanging from the side of the building, the stop light and pedestrian crossing light and especially the strip of sunlight piercing the buildings shadows. That was where all real visual action took place.

The freeway, multitude of yellow poles and fencing, signs, streetlight and utility poles, antennae and left side buildings have a similar intricacy and although laid out across two-thirds of the composition are dwarfed in scale by the entire right third of the painting.
I played down the whole left side slightly while the deep shadow, high contrast, harder razor-like edges gave the right side the punch it needed to describe the compression of time I was seeing crammed into such a small area of the scene.452

Mid-show Night at the Muck

"Scrubber"

"Steel Bundles"

"Colored Tanks"

“Scrubber”
"Steel Bundles"
"Colored Tanks"
watercolor on paper, 2016
6” x 8” (15.24cm x 20.32cm)

Here are my other 3 paintings I have in the NWS Plein Air Exhibition and sale at the Muckenthaler Cultural Center. Today, Thursday March 3rd from 7:30 - 9:00 pm the Muckenthaler is hosting a mid-show gallery tour.
Several artists including myself will be there doing demo's and/or talking about our work. It will be a perfect night to attend if you can make it.

These 3 are the most orderly of my six. Part of that reason is the view I choose and the way I presented them, straight on and compositionally horizontal. Industrial subjects often are chaotic but even when so I can usually find the view that is less chaotic.
When the subject is busy as in "Colored Tanks ", with so much going on in the painted surfaces the straight on view as well as simplification helps make a better painting.

My other 3 in the show are made up of more angles and diagonals compositionally, which I usually favor, but they are simpler to begin with so they needed the perspective views to keep them more interesting.

“Scrubber”
We see these attached to every industrial building. Seen in endless configurations these kinds of machinery are called scrubbers. They clean or scrub the air inside the warehouses, factories and industrial plants. Very similar to my power pole series there is a lot going on with them. With their boxy structures, angles, valves, pipes, wires and ducts it’s their forms that attract me. Sometimes oddly proportioned, gangly in appearance, rusted, worn and weathered they can take on an anthropomorphic character and are irresistible to me so I must paint them.

"Steel Bundles"
Bundles of steel girders, wood haphazardly stacked on top and overlooked by most. I find these kinds of repeating forms a great subject to paint, especially when the stacks are not perfectly arranged. In the simplest form they represent the industrious and hard working as well as both organization and chaos.

“Colored Tanks”

Industrial subjects have more color than most realize. The colorful palette of hues can range from the more earthy to the bright and highly saturated. Then they take on the rich patina of the time worn and sun faded. This one had the two sides of its gates painted at different times and in two different reds. The blues tanks too were faded, its paint water stained in various degrees. I waited for a full sunny day to paint these to accentuate the lively palette.434,435,436

My Work at The Muck

"Storage Yard Sun"

"Railroad Crossing"

"Powder Magazine"

"Storage Yard Sun"
For Sale at DailyPaintWorks, click here

"Railroad Crossing"

"Powder Magazine"
For Sale at DailyPaintWorks, click here
all watercolor on paper, 2016
6" x 8" (15.24cm x 20.32cm)

Here's three of the six paintings I have hanging at the Muckenthaler Cultural Center.
All were painted for the NWS plein air show, an exhibition and sale. The bottom two I painted just prior to the show opening.

Most often I am already familiar with the site and at different times of day. I walk the location, choose a view and proceed to do small, quick but careful studies of complicated subjects, capturing both my perceptions and an honest depiction of any information I see as important. These studies, done in a near journalistic fashion, allow me to get familiar with the subject and later serve to inform my studio work. Through later editing I am able to present my thoughts and views on the subject.

"Storage Yard Sun"
Another of my Storage Yard Series, an all encompassing term for the many industrial sites that I paint that don’t fit any category like refineries or warehouses. This particular day the sun was bright and was bouncing reflected light into the shadows giving the scene an animated quality. I set out to capture that before the light could change and even played it up a bit to give it some life.

"Railroad Crossing"
I often paint railroad locomotives, bridges etc but I also find a certain fascination with the common everyday railroad tracks, crossings and signals. I liked this particular view for the tracks splitting in two directions and had this site in the back of my mind for some time. I knew I wanted to paint it either in the early morning or afternoon to take advantage of the shadows to provide darks for the composition, finally deciding on the afternoon.

"Powder Magazine"
Easily overlooked, what looks like an unassuming little stone and brick building is actually a Civil War era powder magazine built in 1862 for Camp Drum in Wilmington CA. It’s odd to see in the middle of a residential neighborhood down near the LA Harbor since we don’t associate the Civil War with the west coast.
I have driven past it for years and finally needed to get it down in paint. With this study, as well as some others, I plan to develop it into a larger studio painting.431,432,433

Lone 2 - Dockside Red Shed

"Dockside Red Shed"
Watercolor on paper, 2015
15" x 20" (38.1cm x 50.8cm)

Here's a recent watercolor of an old shed in a marina in the LA Harbor. It is similar to this one in it's rendering, although it is a more tightly packed composition, and this one for the lone idea behind it.
I was drawn to not just the shed, I love corrugated buildings, but also the small palm and the two backlit plastic barrels for their luminosity.
Besides adding some shape variation to the composition they countered the predominant rectangular forms with cylindrical and radial (round or circular) forms. Just enough to break up a static composition.

The palm leaves fanning out in the lower left corner and the short retaining wall lead nicely to the barrels and shed, the power lines reinforcing the diagonal compositional thrust from lower left corner. Without that everything is horizontal and square and dull.

After those initial observations that first get my attention, when I sit down to paint I always realize the other artistic decisions that must be made before I put paint to paper. That for me is the real content, the design just aids in making it work.

I have to identify what I was seeing and decide how to portray those impressions through paint.
It's not always automatic.
What I was really seeing was not just the shed itself but how it sat by itself on the large dockside slab, isolated from the rest of the buildings.

The warm bright slightly overcast sky and simplified foreground communicated that idea of the isolated shed and also helped ease its busy liveliness. A nice clear blue sky or clouds would not have done that. Pretty blue skies generally say happy or pleasant, clouds say another depending on how they are portrayed, a dark sky says something else. But a bright nearly colorless sky doesn't draw attention to itself and in this case this reinforces the lone subject.

Since all the vibrancy takes place across the center in the shed itself its shadow needed to belong to it and differ from the barrels and palm shadows. So it starts green at left and after turning the corner is warm blue.

I also decided that since the shed had such a strong red color and aged patina showing the rippled surface of the corrugated metal was not necessary this time... it was busy enough.302

Rusty Haze

"Oil Plant 11 (Rusty Haze)"
oil on panel, 2014
6" x 6" (15.25cm x 15.24)

Number 11 in my series of the Oil Plant, actually an oil pumping station from the 1930's or 40's I think.
(I've done more than 11, some were not titled within the numbers) Unfortunately it is gone now but my series will continue. It is a hazy memory.
I left out quite a bit of the pipes and such in the background, more than I usually do. I reached a point and it just felt right for this one. It was more about the thick atmosphere.
But then I take another look and think it may have been better with just a whisper of them here and there.
Who knows. It's probably better to move on to the next one.292

Labor Day Workhorse

"PHL 72 Limelight"

oil on panel, 2013

5" x 7" (12.7cm x 17.78cm)

The Pacific Harbor Line Locomotive's toil away endlessly.

They make the Los Angeles and Long Beach Harbors function.

Without them the harbors would be one big massive clog, nothing would move in or out.

It is another from my latest locomotive series.

I'm not only using this series to experiment and put down paint in different ways but also looking to make each painting unique in some way, never losing sight of capturing the Southern California light I see everyday all year long.

This was one of those glory moments. I was down in the LA Harbor area and spotted this PHL locomotive towing its prize.

I chased it down, caught it just as it switched tracks, raced back around the corner to get a better position and was just in time to catch it backing up as it passed the lime colored fence. The low-angle afternoon light illuminated the lime green fence, literally and figuratively like a limelight, and since (shiny) black is so reflective... well, you can see.

To further enhance that moment and more importantly my impression of it, I painted the light of a thinly veiled marine layer into the painting for a beautiful atmospheric effect. Gentle, soft, low-slung bright light making long shadows.

I rarely paint a locomotive without having a point of view. No, no, no.

I always see first, the painting in all its totality, then one of a locomotive in its environment. It would be short-sited and do no justice to these mules of the harbor to do a mere depiction of it.

They are the true stars of the harbor. Not the huge bloated 'fat cat' cargo ships waiting to be unloaded, not the pretty white cruise ships with all their 'lace and doilies'.

So their moment in the limelight is well deserved.

Summer Fog

"17th St. Fog"
oil on panel, 2014
7.25" x 9.25" (18.415cm x 23.495cm)

Here is my painting that will be featured at 
Segil Fine Art Gallery in Monrovia California for the "Home, Sweet Home" Show 
(Note: As of this posting the show dates listed here on my blog are correct and have not been updated on their website). 

Opening reception is Saturday, July 26th, from 5:00 - 7:00 pm.
The show opens to the public on Saturday, July 19th.

This is a gothic farmhouse style home in my neighborhood and I have had my eye on it for a while now. This show's theme was the perfect excuse to finally get around to painting it.
But rather than do a straightforward blue sky painting I decided to add the incoming coastal fog. This is a common sight along the coast in the summer and looks like this on those bright sunny days when the marine layer is stirring about.

It rolls in, partially burning off, lingers around and does a good job of suppressing the blazing summer heat, especially when there is no real breeze to help keep it cool.287

Skies

In my last post I talked about the clouds and sky and how I design them for the overall composition.

My skies often have drama but I always keep in mind that they are backgrounds so I don't allow them to outshine what is more important, usually the main subject or theme and I never paint them as an afterthought.
I could make them the primary subject of course, then everything else would step up in support of it.

So even with drama it is always an understated drama, at times just enough to provide texture and participation but not so much it overshadows the rest, even when stormy.
They are a supporting character in the whole of the painting.

Click title under each painting to see original post.

"Union Pacific 4259"

"Catalina Pacific Concrete (Storm)"

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Being a supporting character can also mean using the sky to describe the sentiment behind the subject of the painting as I did below by painting the sky with a certain amount of upheaval.

"303 S. Pacific #1"

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Or by using the sky in a more subtle manner to further an attitude about the subject where I used the sky (part of a design element) as a harbinger of retirement.

"Harbor Line #50 Crossing"

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Or painted in a more dramatic manner as the phantom cloud below. Although it occupies very little of the composition its swooping posture and action plays well to the backlit tangle of pipes and busy energetic composition.

"Oil plant #5 (Phantom Cloud)"

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Or used as drama to celebrate.

"Truck at Rest"

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Sometimes they loom over the subject in an almost menacing way to different degrees.

"HB Power Plant - Dusk"

"Santa Ana River #3 Footbridge"

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Or they may be menacingly fun

"Smilin' Jack"

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Directly pound the subject into submission.

"Dark Rain"

"BNSF (Cajon Puddle)"

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Other times they linger in the background slowly settling over the subject.

"Oil Plant Backside (w/ Storage Tanks)"

"Oil Plant #3"

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I may use them to burn, beat down or choke out the subject.

"Catalina Pacific Concrete - Ruins Study 8"

"Warehouse Rooftop (w/ Palm)"

"Villa Riviera Wrapped for Restoration"

"Study 'Villa Riviera Wrapped for Restoration' "

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Or are left nearly white to make a point about the eventual disappearance of the subject.

"Catalina Pacific Concrete (Demolition 1)"

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Sometimes my skies contain contrails, as a design element variation, allowing me to carve up the sky instead of relying on the usual clouds.

"Gorman Spring"

"Oil plant #7"

"Sunkist Packing Plant (w/ Contrail)"

"Whitepoint Battery Bunker"

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And yes, sometimes I will even use higher chroma or saturated colors in my skies when I need to. You know, happy skies.

"BNSF Mojave"

"Pacific Harbor Line - Weeds"

"Power Pole #5 (2 Buttons)"

"LA River #3"

"Rails, Bridge, Refinery"

Lately my skies have gotten lighter as I explore its subtleties and what I can say with them.

Sometimes choosing an overcast or severely understated sky is the answer, instead of a cloudy or clear blue sky.
It gives the painting a different feel whether it is one of a thick smoldering atmosphere or a cool crisp breath of air.

"Catalina Pacific Concrete - Ruins Study 3"

"Catalina Pacific Concrete - Ruins Study 13"

My skies are never accidental. I always consider how they will play against the whole of the painting and the idea it represents. It is how I arrive at so many variations. I am not painting a sky or clouds just to suit  some design purpose. I am not mindlessly dumping in blue as a background.
I am instead putting down an idea, a thought, a concept, my observations, something about life and using the sky as part of that language.

The sky's the limit (sorry, I had to).

Series - Locomotive - UP 2464 Fire Hydrant

"UP 2464 Fire Hydrant"
oil on panel, 2013
5" x 7" (12.7cm x 17.78)

Number nine in my New Locomotive Series.

For this series, at least early on, my aim is to feature the locomotive in its entirety, in profile and in its environment.
The challenge with that is its horizontal format. That means I have to find ways to counter the side to side emphasis by using verticals and diagonals.
The hydrant was used as a compositional device. It helps break up the foreground horizontal sweep of the otherwise simple vacate street. This is part of my experimenting with the series.

Lighting is another element I am experimenting with. Here I backlit the subject as I did in "UP 4343". The difference in this one as opposed to UP 4343 is the locomotive is under a subtle undefined shadow consistent with the windy, cloudy spring day and not receiving a direct hit of sunlight.
So while UP 4343 has a diagonal streak of sunlight to break up the simplified foreground this one has a strong vertical to accomplish the same.
The same can be said of the clouds in each. It is not by accident but by design. In UP 4343 I designed the light streaking through the atmosphere to echo the foreground diagonal. Here I dragged nearly vertical streaks to break up the horizontal band of clouds and make a better composition.

I have some others in progress for this series that are different formats and views and will begin posting those in the near future.285

Click the 'SERIES-locomotive' label to see all.

Landlocked

"Old Boat"
watercolor on illus. board, 2013
16" x 24" (40.64cm x 60.96cm)


I saw this old boat in the marina in the LA Harbor and it looked as though at one time it was being restored then was just abandoned midstream.
Although there was plenty in the background my treatment of this subject reflects my impression rather than its reality, its blank existence.

I originally began this as a sunrise scene but more or less let that go in favor of a more ghostly haunting lighting.

The green fencing was needed for compositional reasons but other than that I intentionally left the composition bare and sparse including leaving out some of the struts that held her up.
The dark ground plane helped to anchor the boat, keep it from visually floating away and to weigh it down psychologically.269

Links to similar themes in my work:
Tied up Dog
Gutted like a fish
Spot Lighted
Futility
Urban River 3
Industrial Purgatory

HB Power Plant Landscape

"HB Power Plant Landscape"
oil on panel, 2013
6" x 8" (15.24cm x 20.32cm)

Here I painted the Huntington Beach California Power Plant from Costa Mesa. I have heard talk that it is going to be torn down although I have not confirmed it.
But with that in mind I decided to paint it from afar. The idea of it eventually disappearing from the landscape as new life springs up.

The power plant is pale in comparison to the vibrancy of the foreground.

The lively brighter vegetation painted with a sort of lyrical rhythm, pulsating with life while the background, nearly monochromatic, dissipates into the coastal atmosphere.268

Villa Riviera Backside

"Villa Riviera Backside"
oil on panel, 2013
6" x 4" (15.24cm x 10.16cm)
For sale at DAILY PAINTWORKS
Direct link to painting here

The fascinating Villa Riviera in Long Beach California.
I have painted this building a couple times already and always had plans to get back to it. I still don't have clear in my head what exactly I want to do with it or how to portray it. Doing these smaller studies will help me see and decide before doing a larger version.263

12/30/13 I've added this update below:
Two other paintings of Villa Riviera here and here.

*This one gave me fits when I photographed it. I will have to reshoot and repost the image.
**12/29/13 I've updated a more accurate image.

HB Power Plant Backside

"HB Power Plant Backside"
watercolor on paper, 2013
6" x 9" (15.24cm x 22.86cm)
For sale at DAILY PAINTWORKS
Direct link to painting here

The Huntington Beach Power Plant may be getting torn down soon so I present it from its backside and in the background, the marine layer moving in to engulf it, a device I have used before to indicate an eventual disappearance from the landscape. We get so used to some landmarks around us they become a fixture in our lives and we will notice them more when they are gone one day.261

*The color of this pic is a little off, a bit too pink, but when it leaves my photo editing app it looks right.