Darron Lillian, our Plein Air Workshop Instructor for the Mid-Summers Brush in July, this April 2009 received the First Place Award for "Genesee Lake Road" in the Wisconsin Pastel Artists exhibit, at the
Schauer Art Center at the Suchow Gallery. The exhibition runs from April 4 - May 18, 2009. See exhibition
Details.
Darron Lillian is a trained artist and an experienced teacher who has offered to tell us a little about his methods of working and thoughts about his goals in making a painting.
Darron says,
"I have been traveling the small country roads of Southeastern Wisconsin for years and choose the subjects to paint from that familiarity. This corner of Wisconsin isn’t unusual for having so many of these scenic roads connecting people, towns, farms and cities, but its unique topography, and panoramas are accessible to me in just a few minutes of travel time.
I paint these scenes first hand in every season. I set up an easel in the warm months and draw from inside my car during the very cold months. I have come to appreciate how quickly the scenery changes from hour to hour, day to day, and season to season. Sometimes a very ordinary scene takes on an unusual look when I work out these constantly changing patterns of color and light on paper.
I like to incorporate roads, power poles, signs, fences, houses and farm buildings to give scale and reference to the painting. The road, the tilled land with fence rows, trees, and bushes left to themselves are always fair game for a sketch. I search out common place scenes with an unusual twist of topography, color or detail and try to show the observer how interesting these landscapes really are.
I paint in full sunlight, which lets me see the form, shape, and volume of everything in its path. Also, the character of the sunlight comes through in my pastels as the time of year or the time of day whether the landscape is lit from low in the sky or directly overhead. Even the heat or cold; the wet or dry; the calm or wind of the weather conditions appear through to my drawings from my direct exposure to the conditions at the time.
I haven’t pursued the idea that one must find the most beautiful sunset, the highest peaks, the most colorful fall trees to show the beauty of nature. Instead I paint the commonplace rural scenes hoping to inspire an appreciation for the rural beauty we have right here in this area of Wisconsin.
I try to depict the landscape as I see it in an unromantic, unsentimental way avoiding the quaint, or the magnificent and show all the reality of the scene with its many distractions: roadside signs; cracked roads; dirty winter slush; weathered trees; and unkempt weeds on the borders of tidy fields.
I employ a straight forward and direct approach using simple techniques that highlight the use of my rapid technique rather than obscuring it with a smooth polished studio style. The scenery and lighting change so fast that a quick method works best on location. Sometimes I only have a few minutes to sketch the setting.
I aim for balance between true to life illustration of the landscape and quick spontaneous technique that relays the essentials but leaves only hints to detail thus requiring the viewer to complete them in their own imagination."
Darron Lillian
Darron will be teaching two workshops this summer at the
Oconomowoc Mid-Summers Brush Plein Air Event sponsored by the
Griffin Gallery Fine Art and the
Wisconsin Plein Air Painters on Friday July 24th, 2009. For Workshop
details.
