"December Snow", 12x16, oil on panel. snow scene, paintings of snow, palette knife , Chester County, Pennsylvania scene, impressionism, Maryanne JAcobsen art

SOLD

"December Snow", 12x16, oil

Another snow scene. Painted with a palette knife. Please email me at maryannejacobsen@aol.com if interested in purchasing this painting.

"Verte et Rouge", 11x14, oil on panel, green, red, floral, esperanza rose, apples, still life, palette knife

"Verte et Rouge", 11x14, oil on panel

I loved the way these two compliments played against each other as I painted this. I opted for cooler reds throughout, which made the warmer greens pop.

I guess with Christmas right around the corner, I had red and green on my mind.

This painting is available for $850. If you have any interest in this painting, please send me an email at maryannejacobsen@aol.com.

"Inspiration Point", 10x20, oil on linen, paintings of Yosemite, Inspiration Point, Maryanne Jacobsen art, palette knife

"Inspiration Point", 10x20, oil on linen

It was rather daunting to attempt to paint a place that has been imortalized by the likes of Albert Bierstadt, Ansel Adams and Thomas Hill, but after some coaxing from my husband, I decided to go ahead and give it an effort.

We visited Yosemite National Park back in April, and spent three lovely days there hiking and enjoying the beauty of this incredible place. Normally the road leading up to Glacier Point is closed in April because of snow, but there was very little snow in Yosemite this winter, so we were able to go all the way up and enjoy the splendor 7,000 feet up!

Inspiration Point is a popular spot to stop as you drive into the valley because from there you can see El Capitan, Half Dome, Yosemite Falls and other highlights of the park. I forced my husband, son and daughter-in-law to stop there each time we went through in order to capture the different light effects throughout the day.

This was a morning shot and although pretty, it was harder to see the falls. We did miss the wildflowers unfortunately, because the Meadows were still closed, but there's always next time!

The painting was painted with a palette knife and has nice impasto throughout. I hope you enjoy it and if you've never visited Yosemite, put it on your bucket list!

"The Scent of Summer", 12x16, oil, flowers, pink, impasto, impressionism, palette knife, roses, Maryanne Jacobsen art

"The Scent of Summer", 12x16, oil

I had fun experimenting with this painting. I kept wiping out the work I had done when I wasn't happy with it and going over the top with something new. Wiping out was something I got used to hearing about at PACE15. In fact, instead of thinking of wiping out as being a result of making mistakes, it's often a technique that seasoned artists use to get some nice softening effects.

I forget what this is called. Though I know it has a name!

I also used a limited palette of two yellows, two reds and two blues. It does make for a nice harmonic sound, and I do see unity in the work above.

Anyhow, I enjoyed playing with this one and kept the impasto for the end- in the flowers, of course.

"Wildflower Meadow", 11x14, oil on board, palette knife, mountain, colorist art, wildflowers

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"Wildflower Meadow", 11x14, oil on board

This was a color study that I've been working on for the past couple weeks. My goal was to make the color receed as it went back into space. It was painted with a palette knife.

Email me at maryannejacobsen@aol.com if you have any interest in purchasing this color study.

"Mission Morning Glories", 16x20, oil on board, morning Glories, Mission Capistrano, gardens,

"Mission Morning Glories", 16x20, oil on board (note: Click on the image to see the detail better.)


Mission San Juan Capistrano is located in southern California in Orange County, about an hour north of San Diego and just south of Laguna Beach. I have visited it three or four times and never grow tired of that beautiful place. It is a national treasure and historic monument, and most people have heard the beautiful legend about the swallows that return there every year to nest. To read more about the mission and the swallows , please go here.

If you would like to see more of my Mission San Juan Capistrano paintings, just insert the word Capistrano into the search box located in the left hand sidebar.


This painting was done with a palette knife only. It has thick, juicy passages of paint throughout.

Thanks for following my blog. To see more of my paintings, please visit my website here.

"Nature's Fading Glory", 12x12, oil

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"Nature's fading Glory", 12x12, oil

Back in the fall I painted at Winterthur for the Brandywine Valley Plein Air to benefit the Children's Beach House in Delaware. You can read my blog post about the event here

Last week, I decided to do a different version of the scene in a square format and the painting above was the result. I enjoyed painting the scene again, even though I was indoors and not privy, as I was the first time, to the glorious colors of nature all around me, and the bite of winter in the frosty air that morning.

Available through Gallery 444.

"Napa Morning", 9x12, impasto, palette knife, impressionism, Napa Valley vineyards, California art, wine country art, Sonoma, MAryanne JAcobsen art

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"Napa Morning", 9x12

I pulled out the photos from our trip to Napa last spring and decided on one of a vineyard. The challenge was to try to simplify the scene with all those posts going back in the distance.

The other challenge was the fact I had run out of white paint! Not fun if you are trying to finish a painting!

Not sure if I succeeded in capturing the scene or not, but I certainly enjoyed trying!

This painting was done with mostly a palette knife and has lots of juicy impasto in it.

Please contact me at maryannejacobsen@aol.com if you have any interest in this painting.

Plein air versus studio! "Country Road, Take me Home", 9x12, oil on linen

"Country Road, Take me Home", 9x12, oil on linen

I decided to take my plein air painting of the "Cornfields at Granogue", and use that and my reference photo to conduct a little experiment.

Over the years, many collectors have fallen in love with my work, as a result of the colors and palette knife work that I used in my first  few years of painting. Over the past few years, however, I have moved more towards the representational, replacing many of my fauvist colors with colors that more accurately describe the subject at hand. I also began favoring more brushwork in my paintings, as I felt there were more ways to be descriptive with a brush, while the palette knife limits how you can render certain subjects, like clouds or cotton.

So today I decided to recreate the "Cornfields at Granogue", using a palette knife and the palette of colors that I used to use exclusively- which is after the Cape Cod School or Hensche method. This was my reference photo:

I think the thing that hampered this experiment of "which is better", is the fact that the first painting was exclusively plein air- it was finished on site and therefore had more immediacy and freshness to it than the studio as piece, as well as truer color.

On the other hand, I was able to be more thoughtful about the trees in the background in the studio piece and they are probably more accurate than the plein air painting for the simple reason that by the time I got to them that day the light had changed dramatically.

The cornstalks in the foreground were definitely in shadow when I began the painting that morning. Yet I was aware that I was starting to "Chase the light" by the end of the 2 hour session, adding more and more light to those foreground cornstalks and thus rendering the light direction confusing.

So overall, both methods of working have their pros and cons, with different results and I feel that this was a good experiment in thinking about things that will help me paint better in the future.

Would love to hear your comments on which of the two paintings you like better and why!

Thanks for visiting my blog.