Where The Turkeys Roam

This week marks the one year anniversary of Maine-ly Painting!  Hard to believe, but just 52 weeks ago I set out to write a blog that employed useful painting tips with deep insight into the world of art and artists.  Trust me, I'm gonna get around to doing that some time real soon, but for now, this is just one of my usual posts. 

For some, autumn is their favorite season.  The days are crisp and clear, with the heat and haze of summer in the rear-view mirror.  Here in Maine, as in the rest of New England, autumn also means beautiful fall foliage.  Except this year.  Last month hurricane Irene blew through dumping copious amounts of rain and gusty winds that just completely stressed out the trees.  What was a deep green canopy shriveled into a curled up brown and ochre smear.  It has all the color and brilliance of some old 1940's Orson Wells flick.  But I set out to paint it anyway.

Last week I set up in a lovely old cemetery in Dresden, Maine and painted the view.  I like cemeteries.  I enjoy reading the tombstones and trying to envision the life these folks once lived.  Young ladies with their date of death coinciding with the birthday of their last child tell a sad story.  There were also too many stones marking the resting place of an infant.  It was a hard life back in the day.  But there's also a large number of folks who lived well into their eighties and nineties.  It seems like if you made it through childhood, you had a great chance to live a long life.

Cemeteries were also set up on top of hills that at one time afforded a lovely, peaceful view, but now only overlook highways, shopping centers or condos.  But this particular cemetery still has a vestige of what once was.  It has some stately maples crowning it's crest and it overlooks some old farms that have been there for over one hundred years.

I've blathered about my painting technique on previous posts, so I'll spare you the particulars, but I wanted to show the light of early morning on the fields and farms.  That meant getting my butt up and out of the house early enough to be set up and record the sight.  I am not a fan of morning.  Years ago, when I was still punching the clock, I had jobs that required me to be on the job at three in the morning.  That's right-- three in the freaking morning!  I swore then that I wouldn't mind if I never saw another sun rise for the rest of my life.  I've gotten over it, but I'm still not a up-and-at-'em kind of guy.  Luckily for me, though, is that sunrise this time of year isn't nearly as early as in the middle of summer.

I had some visitors while I was working on site.  A lovely lady and her grand daughter take morning walks there and stopped by to chat.  The older lady asked me why I wanted to paint that view?  It was a matter of perspective; here I was intent on painting barns and fields, and all she saw was someones back yard.

I also had some turkeys saunter on up to check me out.  Apparently, they know a distant relative when they see one...

The fall colors never really did pop, as I had hoped, but there's always next year.  Another winter, spring and summer to get through, but also another year of Maine-ly Painting!



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