The O'Neill Corral at Caspers Wilderness Park

Here is "O'Neill Corral - Caspers Park, an 8X10 oil painting on linen, I began this painting about a week ago at Caspers Wilderness Park. It was a return trip from my last excursion there a week before. This time I wanted to paint the old O'Neill Corral, water tank and windmill. They are painted a dusty red and it reminded me of the cowboy days that have disappeared from Orange County. As I drove into the area and opened up my back Jeep gate, a horse trailer pulled in also and let three gorgeous horses out and into the corral. I told the ladies they made my day, I really didn't want to paint an empty corral. The ladies were having a picnic and wanted to allow their horses to graze and that is exactly what any normal horse will do. The green grass was the perfect compliment to the red subjects. I had to peer between the rails to see what I wanted to paint, the space was wide enough.






























In the back gate of my Jeep was my puppy Chihuahua as you will see in a picture here. She is the reason I have slowed down in painting lately. I am trying to train her, it's been a challenge, so far if she wants attention, she is getting it. Of course she wants a lot of attention and I have to sketch in my painting on the canvas fast. Because I do not like to rush a good painting, I have resorted to laying in the composition, mixing some colors I see on the easel palette and taking lots of digital images with my great SLR camera. Then I can go home as the sunlight changes too much and finish the painting in my studio. The puppy has really dictated my life a lot in the past three weeks, so this painting took a week to finish. I would start in one area one day and then move gradually up the canvas in sections and make sure I tied in all the areas by wetting down previous ones, no harsh edges. Someday the pup will want to hang out and relax instead of going pee, poo or nap on my lap all the time, so I can finish a painting in one day.
I also have been very busy entering three juried exhibitions in the past two weeks. This painting has been entered into one. It was a lot of work to get all the images ready and send out checks and applications. I plan on being in an outdoor art show at the Mission San Juan Capistrano on April 4-5. It is with the Socalpapa art association. I am looking forward to that, I will have new art works there. I will hopefully have this little painting accepted into the special juried section at the Barracks Gallery there. Price has not been set yet. If you want me to send you a postcard, email me at ew@visions2art.com. I would love to see art lovers visit me.