I’ve said from the beginning that this blog is about my transformation experience from engineer to artist, and not just about showcasing my successes. Today I’m going to share something I consider less than a success.

A while back I completed a painting of a photo that my friend Sharon Littley took from her porch in Fairfield Virginia.  It was after a storm in the very early spring.  The sky was still wicked dark with white clouds along the front edge of the storm. The sun had come out and there was a partial rainbow contrasted against the dark sky.  The sun was shining on the hills in the foreground, highlighting the pale greens and other colors of early spring.  It really is a lovely and inspirational photograph.  I asked her if I could paint it and she graciously said yes.

Sadly, I don’t think I did it justice. It’s not my best sky.  I did capture the pale greens in the hills well against it.  I knew the rainbow would be hard but it came out okay – although my husband said he doesn’t like it because it looks too solid.

In the foreground of the original picture there were a few shrubs and a young tree, but there was also the end of the gravel road they live on.  I decided this would look better as a meadow. I also added a forsythia bush. My engineer’s brain still had trouble improvising. I think the perspectives in the foreground are off.  I also think it is somewhat unimaginative.  I tried to add a couple of Adirondack chairs in the meadow, but couldn’t get the proportions right so I took them out.  I guess I just need to keep practicing and going off script till it get better at it.

Sharon takes many lovely photos from their porch. I’ve told her that if I lived there I’d just set up an easel out there and paint every day.  The wonderful thing about nature and the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains is that the view is different every day.  It’s a wonderful place to live.

In the meantime, I have two more pieces in the works that I like much better. Both are from my travels in Italy.  Stay tuned…