Santiago Canyon Sycamore

This painting measures 19"x 25" and is done La Carte Pastel Card.  Running through the Canyon is a creek and along the creek are hundreds of Sycamores.  The canyon runs from the edge of the Cleveland National Forest towards the Pacific and ends in the El Torro / Laguna Beach area.  The area was a cattle ranch owned by the Irvine family.  What really interested me was the contrast of the dry grasses and the greeness of the foliage around the creek.  I also found the cast shadows of the tree onto the dry grasses grabbing my attention.  As I constantly try to improve I set many goals for myself.  These are not enormous unattainable things but simple ones that come from seeing art work that I admire and self criticism.  One of these goals is to portray shadows in a more lively fashion.  Seeing the color of the object as a combination of the value change created by the shadow but maintaining it's own identity and proper color relationship to the object casting the shadow and itself has been a recent focus.