"Three Doors Down", 14x11, oil on linen

"Three Doors Down", 14x11, oil on linen

The house with the pink bougainvillea wrapping around the column is just three doors down from where I live. The owners obviously have a green thumb becuase the whole property is gorgeous to look at. I had been wanting to paint this bougainvillea for a while now, and so yesterday, I finally asked permission to stand on the lawn and paint the house.

Today I went down and spent an hour and a half painting the front porch. After that, I decided the light was changing too quickly so I finished it up in my studio. I am going to try it again on a different day because Is struggled with the dappled light on the door and walkway and need to practice  doing it more often.

"Country Road", 9x12, oil on Raymar panel, impressionist paintings, country landscape, woman with umbrella, boat, house

"Country Road", 9x12, oil on Raymar panel

A while back I did a small little study of a painting by  19th century french Impressionist Édouard Leon Cortès (1882–1969).  Cortes is known as "Le Poete Parisien de la Peinture" or "the Parisian Poet of Painting" because of his diverse Paris cityscapes in a variety of weather and night settings.

I fell in love with his style of painting and today I decided to do another painting after his rustic country landscapes. In this version, I tried to learn from him while also incorporating a bit of my own style into the painting.

Learning from the old masters is a wonderful way to improve one's artistic skill. I did many paintings after Monet when I first started to paint, and I never grow tired of what I can learn from the French Impressionists!