Painting Catalina Island 2010

"Descanso Beach afternoon" 5x7 plein air pastel. This is my little gem I painted on my first day, but I do think it is my best of the the trip!

View from Descanso beach.

My painting buddies, (L-R) Louise Smith, Terry d Chacon & Joan Coffey, on our way to Descanso Beach.

"Evening sparkle" 6x8 plein air pastel. I painted these two little paintings on the beach in Avalon, while listening to the Karaoke signers in the bar across the sidewalk.

"Evening sparkle II" 6x8 plein air pastel.

Painting in Avalon has become a yearly tradition with a few of my painting buddies, Terry d Chacon, Joan Coffey & Louise Smith. This is my second year to go, and their 4th. It is so much fun, we paint from sun up to sundown, and in the nighttime. We arrived in Avalon a little after 11 am, and after checking into our hotel, we stopped for something to eat while our room was being prepared. So after settling into our "room with a view" we got our gear together and started down to Desconso Beach to paint the evening light. The beach was full of people and interesting fun music was playing from the bar area. It was a perfect afternoon, with the setting sun on the side of the casino in the distance. I painted a first painting, (not included here), then, I turned around and decided to paint a quick and small 5x7 view of the casino. The light on the building was amazing, and the refection's of the building in the water was magical. I do think this little gem became my favorite of the following 11 paintings I completed during the 3 days were were there. I will post the other paintings in the days to come, so check out the blog, for more Catalina Island adventures in Plein air painting.

Painting Avelon, Catalina Island

Last week my 5 of my artists friends and I traveled to Avelon, on Catalina Island, for three days of painting. We arrived about 1:30 pm, and after we checked into our hotel and had a late lunch, we all walked about to start painting. We settled on a nice location with vistas of the casino and of course all the boats in the harbor. I started to paint the view of the Casino, but found that it was not working for me. I rubbed it out, and made this quick painting of the boats not to far from our view. There was someone fishing in their small boat while their friend watched, from another little boat.

Later that evening we went out, and painted the lights of Avelon. I choose the lights on the pier. The glow from the teal green contrasted with the red from the boats was magical. We had little lights we hooked to our easles. I must say we also atraceted quite the audiance, as folks are accustomed to seeing plein air painters in Avelon, but I guess not to many paint at night. I had not done this before, but found the experience allot of fun.