Saturday, February 16, 2013

Refugio Beach


"Refugio Beach Afternoon"
16" X 20" Oil on canvas

Refugio Beach Painting

I haven't been to the beach in a while but had reference photos that I had taken in the past and decided to go through them looking for a beach scene. I needed a 16"x20" painting for a show later this year in Santa Barbara so I want to show paintings of that area. A nice beach scene would do. I had gone to Refugio Beach which is right off of Hwy 101 down the coast. Refugio is a beautiful little beach that also has a campground nearby, a small store and trails up on the bluffs nearby. I started this one yesterday morning and last night it as pretty much finished...alla prima. I did some small touches to it today and figure this guy is done. I liked the large foreground shadow in this scene. I'm really enjoying shadows lately and thought painting a big shadow on white sand would be lots of fun...it was. At first I painted in this violet mix leaning towards the blue balancing it with white. It is kind of tricky since it appears like a flat blue violet when you put it on the canvas. Only when I added the details of the highlighted sand color and the dark seaweed did it look right. It's really a trip not knowing if the color value is right until these other elements are in. Fun painting.  

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Stunning shadow and as you say they are becoming a big feature of your latest output.

Ron Guthrie said...

Hi Mick, yeah, added them here and there in other paintings but really going for it in the latest....fun!