Going Coastal

Netarts (8x10)

Here are a few sketches from a recent beach trip -- all during a 4 day period including several weather changes...as long as I could get under cover before it rained, I didn't mind -- over cast skies at the beach make for interesting grays.  This one above however was before the clouds rolled in -- a town called "Netarts" (don't ask, I have no idea).

Tide Pool Reflections (9x12)

 This one is my favorite because of the colour and reflection of the pools on the rocks....

  Cape Wall (9x12)

 This is the wall of sand stone at Cape Kiwanda in Pacific City, north of Neskowin...

Gorilla Rock (9x12)

A local surfer told me they call this Gorilla Rock because of the monolithic rock about a quarter mile out that looks like an apes head at certain angles...

Beach Path (9x12)

This one was a quickie of a beach path near Devil's Punch Bowl that led to a rising tide -- an artist friend, James (who had shorts on) braved the water up to his knees to get a sketch of the bluff from the beach -- I played it safe.  Still, as with all failures and successes, it contributes to the "mileage pile" on the way to better paintings...

Goodbye Summer

"Haystack Rock"

Like the fog bank rolling in on this beach, here comes Autumn... In fact, it has been building all summer , so I could have written that line back in July. Every once in awhile we get short changed on summertime weather, and this seemed to be one of those years, yet there were definite highlights and some 90 degree days too.

This was painted spur of the moment -- it was 11 AM when I decided I would chance a run to the coast (about an hour and a half away) and see if I couldn't get one more beach scape in for the season and get back in time for dinner -- which I did. I also managed to go with my family a week later and painted some more that I'll post next time.

The fog receded when I arrived, then rolled back in before I left so timing was good and worth the trip. If you haven't been to Cannon Beach, Haystack Rock is a spectacularly huge and well known formation and surprisingly not the only one shaped like it on our coast -- an hour and a half or so south is another haystack almost identical to this one in Pacific City, several stories high and even another one or two similar to Cannon beach's elsewhere on the Oregon coast I'm told.

Anyway, Fall is here and with it's long shadows, light & colour, more reasons to get out and paint before the rain starts... of course then comes figure paintin' time!

Happy Fall everybody!