Paint the Town Marble Falls TX

Painting a Charming Texas Hill Country Town at the Peak of Bluebonnet Season

I had a wonderful time participating in Paint the Town this year.  This was my first plein air event ever. I'm not ready to enlist in the plein air army yet, but this could be fun once in a while.

First day's work. I love all the roses downtown. I'm a little jealous they don't grow like this in Florida.

A hazy sunrise with bluebonnets first thing on day two.  I was packing up my gear to leave the ranch at Sandy and it was so scenic that I ran and threw together my easel in the nearest patch of flowers and quickly dashed this out. I had to do a lot of it from memory because the sun moves so quickly at the beginning of it's rising.

Painting two on day two. There are really cool cliffs facing part of Lake Marble Falls. I got there early and secured a patch of shade to paint in. Rocks are completely foreign to a flatlander like me so it was an interesting exercise.

Working on my award winning painting in Downtown Marble Falls.

Thanks to Maria Pronske for sending me these great photos.

With award winners Robert Wilkins and Patrick Saunders. Patrick and his wife live in an airstream and travel the country following the Plein Air painting circuit. You can follow them on Instagram @pleinairstreaming.  Photo credit: Debbie Slangal

Painting a still life with the lovely Annie Nelson Sweat of Austin while the newspaperman gets shots. Photo credit: Debbie Slangal

Day three was a bit dreary and I'd already completed my entry for the competition so we passed the time with a little still life demonstration.

With my ballerina during the face-off alla prima portrait painting event. Photo credit: Debbie Slangal

No this isn't some secret trick that helps me paint better. Things get a little blurry past 3 feet and I couldn't find my other prescription glasses. Photo credit: Debbie Slangal

Boss lady and wonderful hostess Janey Rives standing in for me since I had to return to Florida. Thanks to judge John Potoschnik for awarding this work 1st place! Photo credit: Debbie Slangal

The Impressionist Movement and "Plein Air" Painting

Water lilies and weeping willows are what Monet made. He painted the light even when he painted the shade.

I occasionally get out in this Florida heat and paint en plein air because it really helps sharpen my eye and my color matching skills. I think many non-painters see "plein air" and wonder what exactly that means. En plein air is a french expression meaning "in the open air." This was most popularized by the impressionists. 

“In early 19th century France, landscape painting was narrowly circumscribed by an aesthetic code upheld by the conservative French Academy. Painters and sculptors were rigorously trained in the Neoclassical tradition to emulate artists of the Renaissance and classical antiquity. ”

— Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History

Although there were some examples of naturalistic painting in other traditions, in the all important french art world noone was allowed to paint landscapes as they were. Idealized scenes were the only acceptable mode. Impressed by the works of the English painter John Constable, some young artists called the "Barbizon School" were inspired to abandon the formalism of the past and portray nature in a more realistic mode.

An example from the Barbizon School: Fontainebleau: Oak Trees at Bas–Bréau, 1832/1833, Camille Corot. 

The Barbizon painters made studies for their more finished canvases outdoors. They painted farmers in the fields, and many favored the Forest of Fontainebleau because of the wide variety of large trees growing there. The Barbizon painters were active from about 1830-1870.

The Impressionists: Color Theory Meets Plein Air

The next group of young painters came through the forest of Fontainebleau in the 1860s. Back then they had no name, and no theory beyond working in a more naturalistic manner. So they trekked through Fontainebleau and other locales to paint en plein air. Eventually with the application of new theories about light and color to their paintings they developed what came to be known as the Impressionist style.

Fontainebleau Forest by Claude Monet 1865. This work doesn't resemble Monet's later impressionist landscapes at all. This is simply a realist painting done en plein air. Although Impressionists are closely associated with plein air painting, all plein air paintings are not impressionist paintings.

Impression, Sunrise by Claude Monet 1872. The Impressionist got their name from this painting. When it was first exhibited in 1874 a newspaper critic mocked the painting: "Impression—I was certain of it. I was just telling myself that, since I was impressed, there had to be some impression in it ... and what freedom, what ease of workmanship! Wallpaper in its embryonic state is more finished than that seascape." Following this infamous rant the public came to call this group of young painters "impressionists" and they accepted the label.

Impression, Sunrise by Claude Monet 1872. The Impressionist got their name from this painting. When it was first exhibited in 1874 a newspaper critic mocked the painting: "Impression—I was certain of it. I was just telling myself that, since I was impressed, there had to be some impression in it ... and what freedom, what ease of workmanship! Wallpaper in its embryonic state is more finished than that seascape." Following this infamous rant the public came to call this group of young painters "impressionists" and they accepted the label.

So what makes a piece Impressionist as opposed to just plein air? An impressionist painting of a landscape must start outdoors en plein air, but there's color theory on top of it. The impressionists were believers in broken color, which means that you would not make perfect blended textures. You put the paint down and leave it. By doing this you see more energetic brush strokes, but the most important part is it leaves "broken color." The idea is that if you put two opposite colors next to eachother then they vibrate and make the painting more vivid. Above are samples of some closeups of Monet's works.

The Houses of Parliament, Sunset, 1903 by Claude Monet. In this painting you can clearly see the unblended brushstrokes, and even though this is a pretty dark scene even the darkest dark doesn't near true black.

Another quality of impressionistic paintings is that they were painting the light. This means that even if something is in the shadow it won't be very dark. These "high key" paintings hang out mostly in the mid-tone range where you can see the most colors. There's no black on your pallet if you're an impressionist. Because of the advent of commercially produced paint in tubes they had more vivid colors that traveled easily and which are readily accessible (all you have to do is squeeze more out of the tube, as opposed to grinding up pigments). The impressionists responded by applying more and brighter paint, and they could do it anywhere they wanted. It was portable.