Evening Clouds over Mule Mtns.

Wow - I didn't realize that 9 days had passed since my last blog post; time has been getting away from me!  I hope everyone had a wonderful and safe holiday weekend, and is staying warm in the parts of the country getting heavy snows and winter weather.  On Christmas day, I went on a hike up in the Mule Mountains, which are the small range that Bisbee is situated in, and took some photos that I will be posting in a future blog.   The evening sky and the Mules were the subject for my latest pastel painting, completed almost a week ago. 

I have a fascination and affection for roads, trails and paths, probably because of my love of road trips, exploration and wondering what lies around the corner.  I will definitely do a series of paintings at some point, as I am continually inspired by even my simple drives around this region. 

This painting was based on a photo I took during my first photo series taken after I got here.  I made compositional adjustments from the original photo, eliminating some elements and detail, and shifting the clouds so more emphasis was on them.  I generally try to avoid too much blending with my pastel paintings; I prefer to work with color layers to achieve the effect or color I'm looking for.

After taking the photo, I discovered areas that I will end up reworking slightly, such as the holes in the clouds and the dashed highway divider lines, but overall, I was pleased with how this turned out. 

"Evening Clouds over Mule Mtns"

pastel on 320-grit garnet sandpaper.  9x11