The Containment of Overcast (Sunset, Tuesday, 24 August 2010)

William Van Doren, The Containment of Overcast (Sunset from Stony Point, Albemarle County, Va.) Oil on watercolor block, 13 x 19.

After looking at last night’s attempt many times, as I kept passing by it, each time I had to admit: Yep, definitely airbrushed custom van material. However, I do think the experiment broke a little something loose that helped in the subsequent painting, shown here.

Risk-Taking Involves Risk ...

As if to prove that painting every sunset in real time and posting it immediately afterwards is something of a high-wire act, I tried something quite a bit different tonight that I don’t think worked. It had to do with the full moon rising while the entire sky was socked in with clouds and light rain. The idea was to pay tribute to the unseen moon, but the result looks to me very much like a spectacular ... uh, how to say ... airbrush painting on the side of a big white custom van. I may change my mind later, I may even show it to you eventually and discuss it, but for the moment I’m inclined to think I may have to give it another shot. To be continued!

Sunset, Sunday, 22 August 2010

William Van Doren, Sunset from Stony Point, Albemarle County, Va. Oil on watercolor block, 13 x 19.

Painting the sunset presents special challenges to an artist who doesn’t particularly believe in painting ‘what he sees’ – inasmuch as these paintings originate totally in what I’ve just seen! There are many choices, whether to go with what was pretty, what was odd, and at what stage – and then there’s the choice to go with what was there but unseen. This painting stays close to the visual script.

I hope eventually this series, including the writings, may be seen as a progression of explorations of what can be seen and understood at a particular moment. I sometimes think that the slightly uncomfortable paintings, the ones that seemed awkward at the time, like, to some extent, tonight’s and last night’s sunsets, may someday be seen as among the more interesting images in the series.

Sunset, Saturday, 21 August 2010

William Van Doren, Sunset from Stony Point, Albemarle County, Va. Oil on watercolor block, 13 x 19.

Comments are enabled here tonight for the first time. (It’s a long story ...)

Sunset, Thursday, 19 August 2010

William Van Doren, Sunset from Stony Point, Albemarle County, Va. Oil on watercolor block, 13 x 19.

Incidental Meditation

Clouds are high blurry white against a bluish sky so glaring it’s almost gray. If I look into the pattern long enough it becomes a mandala that cancels thought and opens me to something – something I can’t quite identify. I can’t even tell if it’s coming from within or from outside. It makes me breathe, once, very deeply. Then I see (just after I write “It makes me breathe, once, very deeply”) somehow within and without are meeting, as if at the perimeter of my mind. They’re meeting and merging and I have nothing to say about it. I am merely a convenient venue for the merger.