"Idyll Time" new 16" x 20" oil painting by Mark Nesmith

Idyll Time
Mark Nesmith
Oil on Canvas
16" x 20"
2015

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This is another lost gem. I started this painting a couple of years ago. I don't get out much to paint plein air anymore, but I started this one while I was staying out at my brother's place. He has a bit of land and lives in a rural area. I'd take bike rides for miles seeking out places to paint around the nearby farms and pastures. This little cropping of trees was close by and I was often struck by the contrast of the warm field against the deep blues of the sky. For some reason the scene struck me as something Inness might paint. I spent a few hours laying this painting in and was pretty happy with it but for whatever reason I never got around to finishing it.

Flash forward a couple of years and a couple of moves....Elizabeth and I have our own extreme home makeover in progress. We bought a little house and are gutting it to the studs one room at a time. I was going through some of the storage looking for any art supplies I might have hidden and stumbled on this canvas. It was dusty and a little worse for wear but the scene struck me. I brought it to my make shift studio in my classroom a while back and finally got around to it this week. I've spent a little time in the afternoon the last couple of days basically treating the original as an under painting and painting, scumbling, and scraping thick impastos of color on top.The end result is maybe a little more impressionistic than some of my work but I love the lush textures and colors. We've had pretty dreary weather here this week but working on this painting took me away to lazy summer days.