Amazing weekend dodging storms, chasing ponies, making amazing friends, and even slinging some paint!
I prepped a stack of panels of every shape and size because I had no idea what to expect. I’d combed through the participant info sent by both the artists and the Assateague Island Alliance. I stalked every relevant website, blog and facebook post.
And what I learned at the workshop is we are at the whims of nature and wild ponies. Ponies move off-or in to check out your easel (!) in every moment. A camera can barely keep up. Paint?
Here’s my biggest takeaway when I asked Karen. The field studies are meant to be reminders. Reminders of the tints in the sky or underbrush, reminders how the colors and edges of the ponies met and mingled with the background. Most of all, reminders of how we felt in that one moment.
Does she ever complete a work started in the field when she is back in the studio? No. But oh, the paintings she does create, with her field work and memories as references!
Especially after watching the sodden artists at Easton, I had to chew on this awhile. I need to evolve my definitions of “beautiful” and “complete.” I am expanding my definition of “evocative….”