Revisiting the White Barn

We moved from Wisconsin about ten years ago.   As the saying goes "you can take the girl out of Wisconsin, but...".
I have always loved barns, and there was one particular barn by our home that intrigued me. It was situated so perfectly to catch the sun and reflect the seasons. I took so many pictures of it.

Years ago, I wrote a blog post about photographing the barn with many of the photos shown. If you want to see it, just go here.

The barn became my muse for a series in which I could stretch my wings with acrylic paints. I have used oil paints in the past, and so love the smooth sensual glide of the paint. The smells take me right back to the days of academia and smoke-filled (olden days, huh!) studios. But times, conditions and things change, so now I want to use acrylics instead. The problem has always been a fast-drying palette. But armed with a new "stay-wet" palette, I have rallied on.

I wanted to do a series of four to six paintings of the barn; all with the same composition and size. But didn't want to redraw on six canvases. I generally hate carbon paper, but I love lino cutting, so that was my answer. I did a quick plate of the basic sketch that I could then print on each of the canvases with acrylic paint as my first layer - genius, huh?!!

Then I started blocking in the shadows and highlights over the print using the photo as reference.

Then they were done. Practiced ground. Practiced skies. Practiced shading. All and all a fruitful and fun adventure.