Paint-A-Long Mentoring with Albert Handell

From June 21 to 27,2009 - I spent a fabulous week painting along side the master pastelist, Albert Handell, in Taos, New Mexico. There were 10 other painters also involved in the paint-a-long, and it was a great group from all over the U.S. and it was fun to meet them all. We were out painting by 8:15 each morning and painted in a new location every morning and afternoon, with a break in the middle of the day from lunch and a critique by Albert, then back out to paint the late afternoon light. I must say the weather was mostly cooperative, as we were in the midst of the monsoon season in Taos. This however created great opportunities to paint clouds, which were splendid every afternoon. I have always loved the Taos area of New Mexico, but I love it even more after spending a wonderful week painting the glorious scenes of this area. Taos is at about 8000 feet in elevation, so when we were in the sun, it was quite warm, however the air was only in the high 70's to low 80's. I tried to paint at least three paintings each day, but some days, I was not able to, but all in all, I came away with 14 paintings from the week. Some better than others, but I will post them for your enjoyment. My friend Lilli Miles accompanied me on this road trip, which was made the trip even more delightful.

The first day found us in the bottom of the river gorge area of the Rio Grande that is accessed in many areas of Taos. In the morning we painted at the bottom of the gorge area, near the John Dunn Bridge. My first painting is looking away from the bridge looking into the canyon, and my second (not so successful) I painted the rock walls of the gorge. Then in the afternoon, we went up high on the road into Taos, looking across the top of the gorge area. This is a beautiful sight to see right before you arrive in Taos.