July has been a fairly lazy month for us; we must be approaching the "dog days of summer." Taking advantage of a week of house sitting for our Brentwood, TN daughter, we spent many hours painting "en plein air."
Plein Air Nashville
A bright spot of our month has been painting with the
Plein Air Nashville group, which is open to any interested plein air painters. On Saturday, July 21, we painted near the Musica sculpture on Music Row in Nashville. To learn about Musica, click on
Alan Lequire's web site.
On Saturday, July 28, we painted at Belle Meade Plantation. For more information about this 200-year-old plantation, visit
http://www.bellemeadeplantation.com. Bitsy King surprised us by including a photograph of me painting at Belle Meade on the web site on the
Plein Air Nashville web site.
Painting the View from a Tennessee River Lakehouse
Another welcome opportunity to paint outside came in July when one of our favorite people invited us to paint at her Tennessee River lakehouse. You can see the result, named "
Anne's Favorite Place," on my web site.
Leiper's Fork, Tennessee
As always when we are fortunate enough to paint in the Nashville area, we gravitate toward one of my favorite spots--Leiper's Fork, Tennessee. During this trip we painted several historic buildings in the Forest Home community on Old Hillsboro Road. There we met Chuck Lynch, who invited me to paint his family's historic farm and barn. This farm has been featured in many major music videos and on Billy Graham specials. These paintings will be completed soon and added to our web site.
Dunn Bros. Coffeehouse
To check out the site of the September/October 2007 exhibition of the Urban Plein Air Painters of Nashville, we visited this one-of-a-kind coffeehouse (
http://www.dunnbros.com) at the corner of Church and 4th Avenue North in downtown Nashville. We were not disappointed; Fawn and Kevin have established a nice ambience in their new business. Besides featuring great gourmet coffee and food, the coffeehouse has live music on certain days. A section of the coffeehouse serves as a mini art gallery. This autumn it will feature oil landscapes of Nashville scenes depicted on area artists' canvases.
Birmingham Botanical Gardens Exhibition
We were pleased this month to learn from the Birmingham Botanical Gardens, Birmingham, Alabama, that they will be conducting a solo show of my work at their facility for 2 months during 2009. We are looking forward to this future opportunity to show my work again in the Birmingham area.
Jason Saunders' Exhibit at Kennedy Douglass Center for the Arts
We are looking forward to seeing an exhibition by our good artist friend,
Jason Saunders at the Kennedy Douglass Center for the Arts in Florence, Alabama, during August 14-September 24, 2007. Jason's work was featured in the Spring 2007 issue of American Artist Workshop magazine. We have had the privilege of studying with this fine artist at Leiper's Fork, TN, and highly recommend his workshops to anyone interested in plein air painting.
Tips from Clint Watson of Fine Art Studio Online Regarding Taking Care of Oil
Paintings
Clint Watson recently provided tips on caring for oil paintings. In summary, paintings should be stored in the living areas of your home. Basements, attics, garages, and other storage facilities are all prone to wide variations in both temperature and humidity. On rare occasions, the environment gets way beyond our control, and a painting can become submerged in water due to flooding, leaking water pipes, or even firefighting. If this happens to one of your works, first remove it from the water, holding it face up and level. Then, if the surface looks stable, gently blot up the excess water with a soft cloth. Do not wipe the surface. If small areas have begun to lift, you may actually cause the paint to chip off. As soon as possible, contact a professional art conservator who can assess the extent of the damage and determine what can be done to conserve the work. You may also want to contact your insurance company, which may have specific requirements in order for the loss to be covered.
Bragging Rights of Grandparents
"World Series Bound" read the t-shirt designed by our daughter Melanie; her daughter--our granddaughter Katie Gentle--played in the World Series for fast-pitch softball in Marianna, Florida, during July 27, 2007 through August 2, 2007. Needless to say, we have been absorbed in Dixie League All Star Softball recently since Katie's team--the Belles--won the Alabama Fast-Pitch Softball Tournament in Dothan, Alabama on July 16. For the first time in history, Alabama was represented in the World Series by three teams from the same town--Hartselle. In addition to the Belles, the Darlings and the Debs also won the State Tournament in their divisions. Even though Katie's team did not win the World Series trophy, she can add this line to her resume, "I pitched in a World Series game of Fast-Pitch Softball with the Dixie League in 2007." Louisiana won the World Series in the Belles Division. For more information see
http://www.dixie.org. Don't be surprised if you see an oil painting of a favorite softball "All Star" on our web site.
