Painting Out in Nature w/ Plein Air Painter Rachel Dowd | arts IN focus

Rachel, thank you so much for inviting me to your studio, as it were. First of all, this property is gorgeous. I'm distracted by cows and chickens and all the beautiful things, but what I really need to talk about is your beautiful art. Tell me when you started painting. Well, I've always been into art since I was a little kid. I didn't really start painting seriously until about 2013. I asked for a big set of acrylic paint and canvases and brushes and everything from my husband for Christmas, and he got it for me, and I just picked it up from there, really, and kind of got into it at least every week, if not every day from that point on. Prior to that, were you sketching? I mean, because this just doesn't come out of nowhere. I sketched a lot. I mean, when I was a kid, I drew what kids like to draw. I drew Disney characters and princesses and all that kind of stuff, and then as I got older, I just, I don't know, I just wanted to capture the beauty that I saw and wanted to convey it as accurately as possible, so I just kept trying and kept trying, kept trying. It's just something that I really enjoy, and I can't think of anything else other than, you know, my family comes first, but other than that, you know, I think about drawing, painting, whatever. I dream about it. I think about it all the time, so it's just, I guess it's just in me, and I mean, I wasn't born with talent. I just really wanted to get it right, so I wanted to get it as accurately as possible, so I just kept trying until I was satisfied, and I'm still not satisfied, so. Okay, tell me about plein air. Okay, plein air is basically painting outdoors. It's, the French kind of coined the term. All it means is just painting outside and dealing with the bugs and the light changing and the rain and wild animals and the heat and the cold, the sunburn, the frostbite, all of that, so it's a little bit of a sport, and a lot of people do turn it into a sport. They'll hike for, you know, hours to the mountaintops, and it's fun. It's a sport, but it's very different than studio painting because everything changes. The light changes, the values change, and it's all trying to capture what you're seeing accurately and dealing with all these changing, the changing environment, the changing colors, the changing shadow shapes and light shapes and everything all the time. So how? How are you able to, you know, to find the perfect spot and composition and all that, and then everything changes? What then? Well, usually I start with a value sketch, and when I initially sketch out my drawing on my canvas, I draw in the shadow shapes and the light shapes. So even as it changes, I've got those lines to remind me of where the light was and where the shadow was, and I still might change it after the fact, but at least I've got, you know, like home base where I can keep going back to. That's one of the cardinal rules of plein air painting is you're not supposed to chase the light, is what they say, so where your shadows just get longer and longer and longer, you know, in your painting, and then it just ends up getting muddy and messed up, and it doesn't have that freshness that you initially started with. So how long does a plein air painting typically take? Because I would imagine it's not like a lot of artists I talk to who spend hours on a piece, or is it? It depends on the artist, but most plein air artists usually paint pretty quickly, and in about probably less than two hours, two hours or less is probably the average. I do know lots of artists who paint longer than that, or they'll go back to the same location the next day, or the next day that there's similar light conditions, and they'll bring their painting back out and paint on it some more. Usually you have a two-hour window where the light hasn't changed so dramatically that it's, you're really just making it up after that point. So I saw on your Instagram that you, I don't know if all the time, but you have a tool that helps you with your composition. Tell me about that. Yeah, it's called a viewfinder, and it's just got little doors that you can fold down, and they're all different aspect ratios, so you have an eight by ten is a three to four aspect ratio, you know, a square is obviously a one-to-one aspect ratio, so you just pick the ratio that you need for whatever panel size that you have, and you can hold it up, and you can kind of see a scene framed up before you start painting, because it's hard to imagine what it would look like in a painting when you've got everything all around you. Yes, yeah. Okay, so what is it about painting in the setting that is appealing to you? Because so many artists that I talk to work from a photo, or just from their brain, so what is it about being in the environment that is appealing? It's almost like a diary entry, because, you know, it's an experience, so you're capturing an experience that you're, something that you see, something you feel, the wind, or the rain, or, you know, anything that might be going on. I am just always attracted to the light, and how the light filters through the trees, how the light falls on the grass, how, I mean, anything. I can paint anything as long as the the light is attractive and very interesting to me. Color usually draws me. Is there a specific type of paint that lends itself to plein air, or is there only one that is used? Oh no, people use all kinds of mediums. They, oil paint, acrylic, watercolor, gouache, pastel, there's a lot of different plein air artists. I think oil is typically your traditional plein air medium, just because that's what people use the most in the beginning of artistry. And what is your preferred medium? Oil. I do use gouache outside sometimes, though, too, but those are mostly sketches and very small paintings, so. So many artists tell me that a big challenge is knowing when a piece is finished. Does being a plein air painter sort of eliminate that problem? Do you, is it clear when you're done? I definitely have a feeling when I'm getting close to being done, and I have to judge whether or not, you know, that last mark's going to push it over the edge or not. So it is very much the same, but I don't think it's as difficult being a plein air artist to know when to stop, just because when the painting's working, and it's done, and it's reading well, and it says what I want it to say, it doesn't have to be, every detail does not need to be filled in. I like leaving a little bit of ambiguity. I like people seeing my paintings and kind of interjecting their own memories and their own ideas of where I might have painted, or you know, it might remind them of something that they saw when they were a kid, or a place that they went when they were on vacation, or something. Even if it's not where I painted, it doesn't really matter. Oh, the sun is out. Yeah. I know we were talking. I think it's out to stay now. Yes, before we started shooting, it was so overcast, and you were saying you hoped that the sun would come out. Yeah. So you could paint. Yeah. I love that. Okay, in 2013, when you asked for paints and canvas, did you have any inkling that you would become a full-fledged artist, and that your life would become what it is? No, I think it's just something that I really wanted. Yeah. Didn't really matter where it went. I wasn't really aiming for anything in particular, other than being able to paint the way I wanted to paint, and capture what I wanted to capture, and say what I wanted to say on the canvas. So what is the hardest part of creating art for you? Hardest part is probably just the unknown. When you get started on a painting, and you want so bad to capture this scene a certain way, and is it going to come out right, or is it not going to come out right? And it happens both ways. So it can be a very good day, or a very bad day. What's the best part of being an artist? I just like capturing beauty, and getting it down on canvas. And I love seeing people look at my work, and really be able to convey a memory, or something that means a lot to them through that painting. And I like that people have such a personal response to my work. A lot of times it's very satisfying. Rachel, it has been so lovely to be out here on your property, and to talk with you, and really to dig into your work, because it's just beautiful. Thank you for taking the time today. I really enjoyed it. Thanks for coming. For more information, visit racheldowdefineart.com. Arts in Focus on PBS Fort Wayne is funded in part by the Community Foundation of Greater Fort Wayne.