The One Hour Challenge

Happy 5th of July. I am happy to report we've survived another summer Holiday without the neighbors accidently torching our house through their use of alcohol and fireworks.

Headed out for a little plein aire today with fellow painter Frank Speyers. In an effort to spend more time painting, less time driving we headed over to Lowell and settled in a farm field along the Grand River for the afternoon. The second painting of the day was a One Hour Challenge. For you foodies, think Iron Chef with paint and no cheesy chairman. The beauty of the one hour format as far as I am concerned is that it takes the pressure to produce a masterpiece off. Seriously, if it ends up being a disaster you can totally wiggle out of it by saying to yourself, "well, I only had an hour." By setting a time limit you force yourself to work quickly and you begin to build a confidence with the brushes and paint, after all you have to cover the whole surface with paint or its a disqualification. I haven't really got the whole self DQ thing figured out yet, like what my penalty should be. Maybe knocking 5 minutes off the next attempt. Anyway the painting shown here in the field was completed in 55 minutes, including talk-time with the farmer who came out to turn the hay over to dry.