PPAP Paint Fairmount Park

Today the PPAP hit Fairmount Park Horticultural Center to paint some socially distancing Plein Air on a gorgeous late summer Saturday. Its been forever that we have not gotten together to paint with this years pandemic. But since we are all social distancing and taking great care, we decided we could try going out very early to do some painting. We decided to try Fairmount Park in  the city which is spacious and has many interesting sites to try and paint---and not picnic grounds etc., to attract huge crowds of Mask Slackers partying.

In fact there were only families mostly with little kids and a few hikers , a very light crowd with plenty of social distancing. it could not have been a better day, great light, cool and no wind or humidity.

After a bit of walking I found a spot that caught my eye and set to paint. The group all wandered off to find something interesting for them.

I hit it quick as the sun was on the move and I knew the light i liked wag going to change in 30-40 minutes tops.

Liang found a nice spot with shade, Will did too as he brought his tablet to paint on and needed to be in the shade to see. By the time I stopped the sun had moved and my right arm was starting to catch the sun.

                              Liang and Joyce, it was Joyce's first time trying Plein Air painting.

                                                  Mimi and her painting

                             Everyone trying to see what Will did on his tablet.

                                                   Joyce's first painting

                                                       Liang's painting

                                                Joyce's second painting 

We snacked and then just chilled since everyone has been cooped up for all this time due to the pandemic--7 months now-- it was so nice to just lay there and enjoy the out doors and sun on your face.

                                      A nice scan of Mimi's lovely painting

Here is my painting I did today. I thought about doing another but just decided to chill instead. I hope we can go back out in the next few weeks again.

 

Washington Avenue Green

Yesterday under a beautiful blue June sky a few members of the PPAP painted along the Delaware River at the historic Pier 53 at the invitation of Susan McAninley and the The Friends Group of the Washington Avenue Green. The Pier, along with nearby piers, has a major historical significance, is a fish nursery, is part of the Mid-Atlantic flyway for migrating birds, and is an ecological study area. It also has great views of the river, shipping and beautiful Camden.

It was a great day for painting, if a bit hot by noon with temps at 90 according to the thermometer in the dash of my car. I packed my Julian Umbrella for the paint-out as I know how tough the sun can be while painting if shade isn't good or available. A few years back when I was really starting to do a lot of plein air I painted near Delaware one summers day, much like yesterday, and I went sun blind and was really wiped out from the heat. I realized then why I always saw pictures of painters with Umbrellas, sometimes more than one.

My buddy Will and I arrived at the pier about 12 or so and met Susan who gave us a tour of the Green and Pier 53 and we hunted for views to paint, We were soon joined by Dave and Diane and set up to work as we had reached solar noon. There are many, many great views to paint here and I will certainly go back a few more times to paint.

There are not many spots to paint along the river in Philly, access is limited or frankly dangerous and some places like Penn Treaty Park where I first painted with my original group the Dirty Palette Club is way too buys with people on the weekends, as well as a lot of drunks--and drunks love painters! Boy, they love to tell you about their lives and the merits of your efforts and painting theory. You can read about my previous adventures as a painter with the DPC on our blog. http://thedirtypaletteclub.blogspot.com/2012/05/return-to-delaware.html
http://thedirtypaletteclub.blogspot.com/2012/04/painting-delaware.html

Checking the angle of the sun I choose a view where the light would stay pretty much the same till I was done, so I was facing south. There were other great views but I was too late in the day to paint them and the shadows would reverse too soon to get anything done. A little while later we were joined by Susan's husband Frank, who brought the pizza and water! How great is that, a great place to paint and you get feed as well!

                                                          Will blocking in his painting

I got to painting and took a few breaks to talk with Franks and Susan who grew up nearby in South Philly and they told us many great bits of trivia and history about the area and the pier as a way station for Civil War troops and emigration into the US. In fact many of the families in Philly have great grand parents who came in and settled a stones throw away in South Philly.

Diane's Painting in progress 

                                           Dave's painting of the USS New Jersey in progress

There was just a little breeze even though the sun was blazing and soon the tide started coming in as Will and I painted. I used a 12 x 16 Ampersand Gessoboard and no Liquin, just a little terps as it was so hot the oil was setting up fast. It was so great to get out of the studio and a break from the comic strips and listen to the river wash up and the sounds of nature.

                                                         Will and I baking in the heat

                                                                 Will's finished piece
                                                                 

                                                                   My finished piece

 

                                                                     Relics 12 x 16 Oil


 Its very quite and tranquil there in the Green with a few runners, dog walkers and people strolling in and they keep it pretty clean, especially for trashy Philly. The group has done an amazing job rehabilitating this area and its quite a gem hidden away in South Philly. I really recommend everyone go there and check out how beautiful and peaceful this little bit of "hidden Philly" can be.

Around 5-ish we were done and headed home. A big thanks to Susan and Frank and the Friends Group for hosting us to paint and we'll be back soon to paint the Green!

Burlington Plein Air 16

It looks like Spring has evaporated as the heat turned up to Summer this week in Philly just as I was finally able to get out of the studio and back to painting in glorious nature.

Along with Alina I was able to participate in the Burlington Plein Air 16 which is run by 28 E Gallery in Burlington NJ. We both participated in the event last year where Alina won an award for her painting. This year the event was structured around the Historic Yorkshire Garden Tour.

The event was suppose to happen last Saturday with all the painters heading out at the same time to paint, but we were all rained out and so the decision was made to allow painters to have the next week to complete their paintings.


That meant for Alina and myself Wednesday was the best day for us because of our work schedules and so we headed out from Philly up I-95 and RT 130 with a list of two gardens we could paint at.

We decided on the Pearl Blvd. spot as it had the best views that included the garden, river and also some shade, which helped a lot as it was already 90 degrees by the time we got to Burlington and started painting.






















The people who's home we were painting were also very gracious allowing us the use their bathroom, and some cold water which was great, they even gave as small tour of their beautiful home full of treasures from their world travels.























It had been several months since I was able to get out and paint due to my heavy work schedule that includes two comic strips, Judge Parker and now The Phantom, but I plan to be back out as much as possible to paint this summer.

After we finished our first paintings we decided to take a break and have some lunch at Francesco Pizzeria-Ristorante which has fantastic pizza! They even gave us extra pizza boxes to carry our painting back.






















That renewed our energy  bar back to 100% to try for the second garden, however by that time the sun was about an hour from setting which didn't give us enough time to paint and the angle of the sun didn't give us much to work with as far as light for the smaller garden, which was narrow and nestled between two house, so we decided to pack it in and head back to Philly.

 I prefer to pick my spot to paint rather than have something assigned by lottery, but I took the event as just a way to get back out and paint and do like Burlington as a city to paint in.

I'll drop my painting off today and unfortunately have to miss the opening of the show as I will be attending the Wizard World Comic Convention next weekend.

Camp Hill Plein Air

This past week a few of the PPAP members along with myself took part in the 5th annual Camp Hill Plein Air event out in Camp Hill, PA, a very picturesque little town next to Harrisburg, nestled along the banks and rolling hills of the Susquehanna River.

Along with fellow former PAFA Alum, Charles Newman, Alina and William Sentman, I drove out from Philly to take place in the week long plein air event. For us, that was actually the hardest part-- the commute of two-hours each way along the turnpike, which added 4 hours to the long day of painting.

Even harder than that was the fact that on Monday, while driving out to have our canvases stamped for the event, my Jeep blew the 4-wheel Drive trans-axle on the turnpike as we neared Lancaster.

I hopped out of the Jeep as I pulled over just as a huge cloud of smoke billowed out of the engine! I popped the hood to see the engine or part of it on fire! Luckily I had plenty of bottled water in the back and Will and I were able to put the fire out.  The Turnpike Safety Patrol rolled up a few minutes later to make sure the fire was out and I attempted to inch the jerking and clacking Jeep down to the next exit, but it was no go. The engine ran but the 4 wheel drive was toast! So a tow truck was called and $300 bucks later the Jeep and Will and I were parked at my mechanics  2 blocks from my house in Upper Darby. It turns out that a bearing in the trans-axle went bad, super-heated and blew the drive. That part of the story is still up in the air as I am still seeing if I will get a new car or fix the old 1996 Jeep.

So I rented a car for the week and a little lighter in the pocket went back to work on the strip Monday evening. Luckily the Camp Hill organizers were super nice and allowed William and Charles to drive out the next day and stamp all of our canvases for the event.

On top of that I was still under the heavy deadline of producing the Judge Parker newspaper strip all week. So after rushing out to paint and then rushing back home I'd still have to work late into the night on the strip to meet my deadlines. Needless to say this made me a bit tired, especially toward the end of the week. It was a rough week that way. I wanted to be fresh and sharp to paint but I had to many times make myself stop when painting and really think about what i was doing and not plop paint on or get lost in details too soon--all pitfalls of the tired painter.

Many participants for the event were local or fairly close and many stayed in local hotels, which we did do Friday into Saturday to be there early for the Saturday Quick Draw event.  The Quick Draw--or really Quick Paint started at 9am, when you had to get your canvases stamped and then get  your spot, set up and ready to paint between 10 and noon. So we would have to leave too early from Philly if we hadn't stayed over--and we were all increasingly tired each day.

The weather was not the best for us on Wednesday, the first day I was able to paint, with big periods of torrential rain. Another disadvantage for us not being local was finding a good spot to paint meant driving around and burning painting time as we were not familiar with the area. The event gave us a map of the area with suggestions of places of interest to paint.

While we were exploring spots to paint and watching the advancing and growing storms on the radar via our cell phones. The first spot we visited and eventually went back too was  Negley Park. We meet 3-4 other painters there and enjoyed a little chat. Charles and William painted there on Tuesday after stamping our canvases and it offered many nice views and a large covered picnic pavillon. We drove around a bit more but it started raining  really hard. After it stopped, we dropped Charles off below and then Alina and I went up to the picnic area and set up to paint.

 On my phone I could see the storms building again and we could hear the thunder. Just as we found views we liked and I blocked out my painting--BOOM! I really came down.

                                                          The Passing Storm  12 x 16

So Alina and I painted under the picnic pavilion as the storms rolled past. I tried to capture the event in my painting and the storm made for some great atmosphere to paint. As the sun set and I rushed out to grab us some burgers to eat and then squeeked out this little painting in about 45 minutes.

Sunset Bridge 8 x 10

                                     The day ended with a great sunset after the big storms.

                               Lunch with a bunch of our fellow painters and photographers

Alina and I drove back out to Lancaster on Thursday and searched for spots to paint, Will and Charles were not able to make it due to work. There were many beautiful sites we saw to paint as we drove around, but they were so often in spots you couldn't park or would have been set up 2 inches from the road with trucks  and cars flying past you.

Eventually with the sun now past solar noon we found a nice spot with shade  that offered a nice view of an Amish farm. When we pulled up there were also many cows, so we both thought-great!  But as we set up, one by one the cows all got up and walked off!

Oh well.

So Alina and I went to quick work on or paintings in the hot sun, both of us in semi shade. Soon the mother and one of the daughters from the farm came over to see us and ask a few questions. The daughter even liked to paint herself-so I gave a mini-painting lesson and talked as I worked. A little later they came back, this time with more daughters and some meadow ice tea and cookies! They were super nice people and the cold tea and cookies hit the spot!  I fought an constant barrage of spiders, ants and caterpillars in a steady pile-on as I painted away under the tree--I must have looked like I had some afflictions to those passing by as I was fencing and flicking bugs away. The bugs seemed to sense which paint dollop I was about to choose and plop right into it!

As we finished up our painting as the light had changed too much, the father came over with his son to watch. 

After we were done and eating our cookies Alina and a stray chicken made friends!

Friday we drove back out and took our framed paintings to hang in the show. We could only choose two painting from the ones we completed during the week. I choose my two larger paintings, though to be honest I was kinda " eh" on both. I was off my grove between the Jeep, work and lack of sleep...but that's how the egg breaks.

The great news is that Charles got and honorable mention for his painting of the Bridge and the judge did give a shout out to both Alina and me for our paintings in the competition.

                                                    Another one of Charles paintings

We schmoozed and talked with many a fellow painter into the evening. It was great event but I was really drained from the week and on 3 hours sleep the roll-away cot at the hotel felt like heaven!

Yours truly in front of two of my paintings

Saturday we all got up early and hit the breakfast buffet and then got our canvases stamped and rushed to find our spots to paint for the Quick Draw! I stopped painting about 11:35 and rushed back to Willow Park to set up my painting for the judging. 

The judge stopped and looked at my work about four times--so for a second I thought I might have stood a chance.

Here is my paintings of the Trinity Church

Williams painting in Willow park

And Alina's painting of the Space Potatoes which won the Artist Choice Award! 

                                                      Alina with her winning painting

There were really big crowds for the Quick Draw as well as all kinds of great food and refreshments. People walked up and down the street too look at the work of all the artists lined up for the judge.

I am so happy for here and for the fact that us PAFA peeps took home a few awards from the event. So I hope to try and go back next year armed with the experience of this year and a better battle plan. Everybody at the Camp Hill Event made it a really enjoyable experience, so my hats off to them!

So it was a fun week of painting despite the obstacles that tried to make it seem as if it wasn't going to happen at all at certain points and its always great to paint with friends.