I am finishing landscape drawings today, and I need some inspiration. Some picture to look at to help me think about those last steps in my own pictures. I want something that captures the feeling of nature, the light, the air — that’s translated it all into pigment and kept the gritty directness of it.
So this scene by Willard Metcalf, “The North Country, from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York is going to be my “picture on the wall” today — on the wall in my mind. And whenever I need a breather, I think I shall go and breathe this air.
Aletha Kuschan's Weblog 
Oui, il est beau et tranquille!
Catherine
Indeed Aletha, for painting landscape it is necessary a lot of inspiration. Me personally, I need beside the inspiration also things like: will power to wake up early for the adequate light, to prepare all the equipment;colors,brushes etc..,, for finding the best place and view for the best results etc, etc…All this in addition to the main meaning of painting, as you mentioned.
Doing certain kinds of painting can indeed be daunting. I don’t know how some of the outdoor landscape painters manage. In my case, though, I’ve been constrainted rather a lot lately about what I can do so I have sought to make the doing of art as easy as possible. Toward that end, I’ve been working in oil pastels on paper so that all my materials can be assembled quickly. I paint from photos so that my subject is always available. And I’ve adjusted to the vagaries of the light. At night the ceiling light turns all the colors to yellow, but somehow I just paint anyway and in the morning when I see them in natural light they seem to have survived! But from these drawings, I am keeping my skills sharp and when the weather warms and I have chances to work somewhere on location I know I’ll be ready.
But even in this interim, the pictures I do by these other methods have their own virtues. I guess I just love doing it so much. Drawing, looking, putting the colors down — come what may!
thank you for your comment, egophen!
It looks like Vermont, it does feel like Vermont,
When can we see yours?
I don’t know what place it depicts. As to mine, I’ve got some landscapes I’m working
on as a group … they are in the “almost finished” zone.
What inspired you to use Willard Metcalf for today? Do you have other landscape artist you admire as well?
Actually, I suppose I posted Metcalf’s picture because I have not thought about him in ages. I saw this painting posted at another media site. Also, I’ve been doing lots of landscape drawing lately so “landscape” has been much on my mind. But ordinarily my ideas of landscape are formed by other artists, ones as different from each other as say Winslow Homer and Henri Matisse.
Fun question, thank you for asking!