Stewart Jones Art

I've recently started a class to teach watercolor painting. After thirty years of practice I've decided I must have something to share. The first two weeks I instructed seven students at Gallery on First. I did a demonstration in class and the students followed along. The subject was painting a white house in a simple landscape. I found a photo of an old house nearby and did a simple drawing. I started with the sky and then put some light colors into the building. I didn't let the sky dry before I started dropping colors in for the distant foliage. Mixing the different shades of green and adjusting values to make an interesting composition. I painted in the fence, darkened the side of the house and added shadows. The painting looks better than the old house did. If some one you know would like watercolor classes, please contact me so I can pay the rent on my "Old White House."

A full sheet of 22 x 30 watercolor paper is quite an ambitious painting for a paint out. I created the painting of the Path Along The Lake by working on the painting during a series of days at the same time each morning. I awoke refreshed each morning of the paint out. Especially because the temperature in the cabin was 38 degrees and I was glad the night was finally over. A lot of this painting was created while I had my winter coat and gloves on. I think spring is finally here and I look forward to a month of painting on location before the heat pushes me into the studio again. This path along the lake was where I would walk each morning while I decided where I would paint for the day. The first morning's walk produced a few deer, some water birds and I followed a bobcat for a while until he noticed he wasn't alone. Wekiwa Springs State Park is a great place to go to observe wildlife.

Another painting from the Wekiva Paintout includes a deer running across the field in front of the viewer. There were many sightings of deer in this park; usually at dawn and dusk. As I was driving through the park this deer ran right in front of my truck. I wanted to do a painting of the pine trees in the golden field of grass that was glowing in the park. So when I saw the deer run through the field I knew this would be my inspiration. The following night; a couple of hours before sunset, I started the painting. Beginning with the warm sunset and following with the distant trees the painting started taking on life. I enjoy the technique of painting natures grass so I started painting in the basic hues of the glowing grass. I painted a few of the smaller pine trees so they would blend in with the still wet trees in the distance. The sunset rapidly and I had to pack up and finish the painting the following night. What do you think about the combination of the warm sunset and the grass...

It was a great week of painting at the Wekiva Paint Out. I stayed in a cabin on the property so I could get up early each morning and begin the day with a quiet walk and a warm cup of coffee. Some days I would wake to see that the wild turkeys had already gotten a head start on me, running right through the campground and laughing at me in my long johns. I did a lot of painting on Lake Prevatt, just down the hill behind the campground. I knew this might be a once in a lifetime opportunity. This area is not normally open to the public so I took advantage of it, creating quite a few paintings of the area right around the lake. On my first morning walk I came across a quite area of the lake and immediately went back for my easel and paints. I had a frame already set up for a wide horizontal vista and this view provided the perfect opportunity. I wanted to express the tranquility of the morning with the reflections of the distant trees reflected in the still water. The waterfowl was abunda...