I paint at the Yellowstone Heritage and Research Center weekly. They hold the entire collection of Yellowstone artifacts, cataloged in their archives…from natural science specimens, to Native American treasures to army relics and Thomas Moran oils, watercolors and personal journals, etc. etc. etc. For an artist with a Yellowstone bent, it’s a still life extravaganza!
During my 4 years (and still counting) painting there, I have learned a bunch. Not just the more obvious Yellowstone history and wildlife biology lessons, but even more obscure lessons in color, reflected light, and composition. Still life in general is a good teacher of these concepts because your subjects ‘hold still’ and you can really observe them, for as long as you’d like. But combining still life with Yellowstone history, really keeps me interested.
At our gallery, I’m dedicating a wall to this project. I’m collecting painting after painting. As a collection, it has a life of its own and becomes even more interesting as a whole. I’m really not sure where I’m going with it – but as long as I’m learning I feel I must be headed in a good direction!
My subject for this week was a male Pine Grosbeak collected in 1955 in Yellowstone National Park – Pinicola enucleator. Maybe it’s my Spring Fever, but I’ve been on a bird kick lately. And they have a lot of varieties of ‘birds in a box’ at the Yellowstone Heritage and Research Center. The variety of colors and shapes is appealing to me to paint. In my art, I like to give people a different view – who would have thought that dead birds in a box would be interesting to see as a painting!
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| My subject - a Pine Grosbeak from 1955 collected in Yellowstone National Park |
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| My 'sketch' on the canvas - I use this stage simply as placement / composition. |
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| Here, I'm starting to block in colors, trying to find an appealing harmony. |
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| Now, I have the painting blocked in and can start adjusting and putting in details. |
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It's time to 'let it sit' and I'll revisit it later with a 'fresh eye', to make any final adjustments.
(FYI -I took this photos under different lighting conditions, so the colors look like I adjusted them more than I actually did.) |
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This painting is from the same 'birds in a box' series, done a couple weeks ago at the Yellowstone Heritage and Research Center....a Mountain Bluebird male and female with eggs.
I'll keep you posted, as my birds in a box series grows.... |
2 comments:
These are beautiful - and morbid all at once. What a compelling project! Go Shirl Go!
I agree! I love to show a 'different view' of something through my painting, get in a metaphor on life and maybe make people think about it just a little differently. This sure is it! A painting of dead birds seems to remove you just far enough from the actual subject to present it in a different light, so to say - And therefore, lets you think about it with just a little change of perspective. There's visual interest in the colors, textures and composition that can be appealing. The 'bluebird family' in a box with their eggs, like you said, has a 'morbid quality' - but there's something comforting, quiet and beautiful with the 'family unit' arranged together in the soft harmony of colors. Like life, bittersweet!
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