Outside in April Finale

After three sessions of 90 minutes to 2 hours the view upstream on the creek is finished. Sometimes you have to simply stop. This was a great learning experience, and so has each outdoor session been. Tomorrow I'll start another outdoor work, maybe here along the creek or maybe over at Gray's Lake, where the parking lots are closed but you can still walk or cycle into the park. Either way, there is always more to see, more to think on and more to learn outdoors.

"Upstream, April Light," oil on panel, 9x12

The great thing about these serial works is the record they make of the subject. That is, if you go back and look at the earlier works this month using this same view, it's obvious how quickly the undergrowth grows and covers the floor of the woods. Monet had the right idea.

Outside in April Three

For nearly the first time this spring we've had warm dry days with few clouds--absolutely perfect spring days. I posted earlier this week that the weather and light led me outside to paint the view upstream on Druid Hill Creek, and I've continued that. I've painted at the same spot along the bank at the same time of day for a couple of days. As you can see in the photo, the honeysuckle is a beautiful light green and the creek runs clear over a rocky bottom. Left to finish is the sandbar and rocks and an overlapping honeysuckle growing on the near bank. If the weather holds, it might be done in a day or so.

Outside in April Too

So many people are keeping themselves away from others that the physical world has actually changed--cleaner air and water, quiet streets and wild creatures coming into cities to name only a few alterations. Many places are locked down and people are unable to go outdoors but here in Iowa the outdoors calls and we respond, most keeping their distance.

The closures of most workplaces and schools, though, means that our parks and trails are actually crowded with people as they seek sun and warmth after another midwestern winter. And that makes it harder to paint outdoors, at least for me, except here along Druid Hill Creek.

Yesterday was a warm sunny day, a relief after a week or more of high temperatures in the 40s. I spent two hours outside on the bank, working on a new view upstream. The sun was brilliant and warm and the honeysuckle has begun its spring explosion of growth. Today will be another two hours or so, basking in the sun and working.

If it goes well, I'll post another interim progress report.

Outside in April

The weather has been cold in flyover land, with highs in the mid-40s at best, and damp these past few days, hampering outdoor painting. So studio work has occupied a lot of the time. Happily, before the weather closed in we had some bright sunny days, mostly warm, that gave time to get outdoors. Warmth and earlier rain has caused honeysuckle undergrowth across the creek to burst into leaf, its sprays and clouds of green already scattered and beginning to hide the bare earth.

This spring one of my resolutions has been to work outside as much as possible, but with pandemic restrictions I have had to limit trips away from the home studio. The view downstream on the creek has been a favorite subject in years past, mostly because it's closer to the studio, but those earlier works were mostly watercolor. My current work is almost all oil or digital, and until now only downstream looked interesting to me. But with the sun streaming down into the honeysuckle I turned the other way for a new view.

This painting is 16x12 on panel, done looking upstream from the creek bank. The honeysuckle and grasses have begun to glow in the warm shady recesses of the woods. It took three sessions of about two hours each. After that the light changed too much. The honeysuckle branches bowed over the opposite creek bank, and in the distance a fallen tree has washed onto the shore.

"Upstream," oil on panel, 2020

I stood on the bank's edge for this one, in a cold wind that made it necessary to go indoors and warm my fingers once in a while. Even wearing good mittens wasn't much help, so every twenty minutes or so I took a few minutes to thaw. During my next to last trip inside, when the painting mostly looked like this, I heard a distinct thud and rushed to the window. Sure enough, my easel had blown over in a gust, but at least it had remained on the bank. When I got outside I found that the painting had been ejected from the easel and flown into the creek, where it was floating downstream. Naturally, I scrambled down the steep bank and retrieved it, almost falling into the water in the process. Luckily I stayed dry, the lightweight panel floated, and there was no damage. Ditto for the Open Box M. I found my brushes, cup, and rag, but the cap to the cup was nowhere to be found. Next time I'll weight down the tripod in the wind.

Pandemic Faces

The covid-19 pandemic continues to devastate the world, taking the elderly and ill disproportionately, invading extended care facilities, overwhelming hospitals and health care workers, shutting down economies and businesses worldwide. As gloomy news continues and many have died, the impulse to draw has been strong. We see faces of people on television and the Internet every day who work on the forefront in hospitals and clinics and essential services like transportation and law enforcement--working on behalf of society--who have died of the illness. Their stories are often so compelling that the urge to draw them in homage and mourning is strong.

These digitalia are an homage to all of those whose work is essential, lifesaving, and the underpinning of civilization.

This is Frank Gabrin, thought to be the first ER physician to die here in the U.S. He lived in New York City where he worked in one of the emergency departments that are still overwhelmed with suffering. Before he died he was forced to work with actively infective patients without sufficient protective equipment but continued despite his own personal danger. He died within two weeks, a true hero.

The digital drawing to the right is of one of the truly brave Italian physicians, his exhaustion and anguish etched on his features. Although available data is still not clear, Italy has definitely suffered at least 150,000 known cases and about 20,000 deaths. The toll on nurses, doctors, and other health care professionals is probably 50 or more by now.

This is Dr. Li Wenliang, the first hero of the pandemic. He is the Chinese ophthalmologist who first reported what he believed to be a new viral illness, and later died of it. Although he reported the problem to colleagues in late December 2019, he was officially silenced by the Chinese government, who said that he was spreading untrue information. He died in February. Had his warning been heeded, many would have lived.

Nurses, who spend hours at the bedside of the sick, find themselves exposed to the coronavirus for longer and longer periods. Many nurses, like the ER doctor above, either have had inadequate protective equipment or have had to wear the same gowns and masks for an entire shift or even for several days. Lisa Ewald, RN, the nurse sketched digitally here died after being symptomatic and unable to be tested. However, her symptoms and exposure make it certain that she died of the virus.

Victims of the pandemic are everywhere, many in the service sectors of this country. The fellow pictured to the right is Jason Hargrove, a bus driver in Detroit, Michigan. Mr. Hargrove became famous because of a post he made on the Internet deriding a woman on his bus who coughed a number of times without covering her face. He pointed out correctly and profanely how an unthinking person could endanger everyone, particularly people like himself who were working on their behalf and to continue feeding their families. Within two weeks of his posting he died of the virus.

Not all victims of the virus have died. In one recent episode, the skipper of the USS Theodore Roosevelt, an American aircraft carrier based in the Pacific, was cashiered by the Acting Secretary of the Navy for sending more and more urgent requests for assistance for his 4000 person crew after the virus infected a number of sailors. Captain Brett Crozier, acting in faith with his crew, contracted the virus himself. At this writing remains alive and in isolation, but his clinical status has not been reported.

A global disaster is almost impossible to actually understand because the sheer enormity and scope is beyond the experience of anyone alive. Drawing these faces has been a way to humanize the shambles of our world. No doubt there are many many more to draw.

Looking Upstream

Most of my paintings of Druid Hill Creek or environs are views downstream. Lately though I've paid more attention to the opposite view, southward. The land rises to the southeast, first with a steep bank and then a hillside, the top of which is at least 30 feet higher. The banks are wooded and often dark, and it's harder to see that direction from the studio windows. Nonetheless, the last couple of weeks I've taken an easel outside and worked on the upstream view.

Hoff, "Upstream, Early April, oil on panel, 9x12

The creek widens and shallows as it bends and heads more northward. There is a sandbar that is uncovered when the water is low, as it is now, and tall trees line the western bank. In the early and mid-mornings, tree shadows cross the stream perpendicularly and the water takeson a yellow to dark appearance. Mornings can seem less focused, somehow.

A Few Weeks Ago

Hoff, "Winter Sun," gouache on panel, 6x8

This particular painting is 6x8 on a gesso panel, done using a kind of gouache. The panel was an old, stained one (notice the pool of transparent dark, upper right) that was in the studio. The gouache base I used was titanium white to which I added staining watercolors to make the colored passages. Normally when painting with gouache you'd use several tubes of separate hues, but this method seems to work in a pinch. This is the view of my studio window in mid-February, around Valentine's Day. Quite a change in six weeks--the grass outside is bright green and the honeysuckle undergrowth is a frothy, yellow-green cloud.

April at Last

Hoff, "Downstream, Early April," oil on panel, 9x12, 2020

Although it is still a little chilly on some mornings, it has been warm enough to paint outdoors several times this past week. I did wear mittens and duck indoors every so often to warm up. Nevertheless, it's clear that spring has arrived for certain. The predictions for the coming ten days are for every day highs to reach the 50s(F). This is the result of about three outdoor mornings while shadows still covered most of the creekbed and made the stones stand out where sunlight raked across. It was took a couple of short indoor sessions to add fine detail. The honeysuckle undergrowth along Druid Hill Creek has burst into very early leaf in the last two days. In fact, there was no greenery at all four days ago when this began, and now there is green everywhere along the stream. In this time of pandemic, this turn of season fills me with hope.