Painting Trip to Kamouraska 2017 - Part 2

Blog 40

This is the second part of my travelogue of the September 9 - 16, 2017 painting trip to Kamouraska:

Monday, September 11, 2017

We had just an amazing day! The sun was shining from sunrise to sunset, and it was pleasantly warm if you stayed sheltered from the wind.

The Overflowing Garden, oil, 5" x 7"

Janis, Hélène and I spent the day painting together again. We started out at the Avenue Chassé, where we painted the flowers of a beautifully planted private flower garden. Unfortunately, we were not the only ones admiring the multitude of flowers -- whole groups of people showed up to take pictures while we were painting. I started with a 5” x 7” painting of sweet peas growing all over the fence followed by the garden, this time towards the blue house of the restaurant L’amuse-Bouche. 

View towards Île aux Corneilles at Low Tide, acrylic, 8" x 10"

After lunch, we felt too tired to drive out again. Instead we walked along Avenue Morel with our small painting kits looking for a place close to the house so we could easily go back for a nap. At the end, we stayed a couple of metres west of the house on Avenue Le Blanc and painted the low tide. I felt so energized after the first painting that I created another 7” x 5” painting of some wild roses. I am quite happy with the little painting, even though I did not have any magenta in my small acrylic set. I have to brighten up the colour a little bit when I get home. Magenta is one of the colours that is really hard to mix, I usually have a tube with me when I go to paint flowers but I had not really planned to paint with acrylic paints on this painting trip. I had brought them in case we found a picturesque spot that was not accessible with my usual painting cart.

Kamouraska Sunset, oil, 12" x 24"

After our Happy Hour, we finally, after years of talking about it, went outside to paint the sunset. Unfortunately, there was not a single cloud in the sky, which would have made the sunset even more dramatic, but we all managed to capture a stage of the sunset. If you have ever watched a sunset, you know how fast the sun moves. It is a question of minutes. Even though we are used to the fast changes while painting outside, this took it to a new level. The sky and the water change constantly. None of us even took the time to take a picture.

I am extremely happy with my day. I cannot remember ever having painted five paintings in a day, not that the quantity really matters, but I was excited and energized enough to paint for six hours. That’s a long time of concentration.

After finishing the sunset painting, we devoured Hélène’s vegetable quiche, salad, and goodies from the bakery. After cleaning the dishes, we all were so tired that it was a quiet evening of checking emails, puzzles, and knitting. Spending so much time in the fresh air concentrating on our painting subjects makes it hard to get through the evening. During the painting trip, even I go to bed an hour earlier than my usual midnight bedtime.

Thank you for reading my blog. I hope you will return next week for part 3. If you are interested in my day to day news, please go to https://www.facebook.com/KerstinPetersPaintings.