Wood

Lately I have really enjoyed working with and painting on wood. I still work with the steel siding, but wood has held the greater appeal most recently. I love the warm tone that underlies my images and the how the wood grain shows through. I also love that it is free. It does take some work to prepare it if I want a smooth surface, but that doesn't cost me anything other than time. ( I realize the casualness of that sentence makes it sound like time is something I have a lot of, and like most people that is untrue! However, lucky for me, I enjoy the process)

My next painting is on three panels of old weathered wood from a crate. It was slightly weathered when Eric brought it home from work a year and a half ago, but I went ahead and let it sit out by the garden to cycle with the seasons, randomly rotating the boards, until two weeks ago. All that exposure caused the surface to darken quite a bit more. I'm almost done with another painting and I like to start prepping the surface for a new painting before I'm actually ready for it so there is not much lag time between paintings. The three boards next to each other were pretty close to the dimensions that I wanted, so down to the wood shop they went. 

I'm not planing this wood. I like the tone and texture of it, so it only needed to be cleaned a little, measured and put together. My intention was to get started on the it right away, but I got a little carried away looking at it and then I had to go and get my camera. 

I love how the wood grain is raised and looks like sunbursts around the knots. 

The texture is amazing. This last photo reminds me of an arial landscape shot of just about any midwestern state. 

I had a good time exploring the surface of the wood before I put it all together. Now it's my pastels that are doing the exploring as they form the beginnings of a sprouted apple seed on the newly prepared surface. Working with the texture is challenging, but I'm enjoying it so far.