BBC4 Tales of Winter: The Art of Snow and Ice

Tonight, BBC4 is repeating an excellent programme Tales of Winter: The Art of Snow and Ice which explores how the onset of winter has been depicted by Western painters across the centuries. The programme will be available on BBC iPlayer shortly after it is broadcast at 7.30-9.00pm.

If  you don't live in the UK and would still like to see it, I suggest you take a peek at YouTube and view the same programme in six films of 10 minutes.

The programme comprises several commentators, many of whom are wrapped up warmly and clutching reproductions of the paintings as they revisit places the artist knew and review how similar the painting is to what's there today. I'm a complete sucker for programmes like this and I'll definitely be watching!

Tales of Winter - The Art of Snow and Ice

• Part 1 of 6 covering the very cold winters in the 16th century - including Brueghel's painting of Hunters in the Snow - the first ever painting of a landscape under snow - with comments by Grayson Perry and Jonathan Jones and a cartoon based on it by Peter Brookes

A Frost Fair on the Thames at Temple Stairs (c. 1684) by Abraham Danielsz Hondius (Abraham de Hondt)

• Part 2 of 6 - this features paintings of London and the Thames during the Little Ice Age
• Part 3 of 6 - covers Jacques-Louis David's paintings of Napoleon's campaign in the Alps and The Abbey in the Oakwood by Caspar David Friedrich and the impact of winter in the Alps on John Ruskin - and his paintings of the glaciers 

The Abbey in the Oakwood by Caspar David Friedrich

• Part 4 of 6 - continues with 
• Ruskin's painting of waterfalls including "Le Cascade de la Folie, Chamonix" 
• before moving on to the Impressionists' absorption with the colour of the snow effect "the illusive colour of the shadows in snow". The programme visits Vetheuil where Claude Monet lives when impoverished and where his wife became severely ill. It shows you the house he lived in when he had to choose between paint or medicine for his wife. 
• It also include paintings of winter by the American Impressionist  painter Childe Hassam.  
• Next it considers what is probably the first ever photograph of falling snow - "Winter, 5th Avenue" (1893) by Alfred Steiglitz and other photographs of "The Terminal", "The Flat Iron Building" and "The City of Ambitions"
• Part 5 of 6 - focuses the contrast between rural and urban winters. Giovanni Segantini painted the Swiss mountains in all seasons including winter.  George Bellows, one of the Ashcan painters, paints the raw, bitter, cruel New York winter in The Lone Tenement and John Nash, a  Royal Academician and serving solider fighting in the Artist Rifles Batallion, paints the bitter winters of the First World War

Death (1898-99) by Giovanni Segantini (1858 – 1899)

The Lone Tenement (1909) by George Bellows (1882 - 1925)

Over the Top - 1st Artists' Rifles at Marcoing, 30th December 1917 by John Nash

• Part 6 of 6 looks at the work of Nevinson and highlights the pla ing of a football game in winter and a wonderful photograph of Stonehenge under snow by Bill Brandt while Don McCullin comments on what's involved in photography in winter.

I guess my only criticism of it is it presents a curiously Western European/American view of landscape painting in winter - and misses out the very significant contributions made by the Scandinavians, Eastern Europeans, Russians and Canadians.

Tate Pictures: Winter Solstice

Click the frame icon above the small thumbnails
to see the paintings in large slideshow

Tate has put up a themed collection of artwork on its website relating to the theme of Winter Solstice

It includes a number of landscapes and streetscapes of places in winter and by artists of different eras and styles.

Click the box icon to see the slideshow version which is excellent.

The paintings are:

• The Boulevard de Clichy under Snow 1876 by Norbert Goeneutte View the main page for this artwork
• Ivy Cottage, Coldharbour: Sun and Snow 1916 by Lucien Pissarro View the main page for this artwork
• Circuit Railway at Grenelle 1922 by Antoine Villard View the main page for this artwork
• Stockholm in Winter 1928 by Stephen Bone View the main page for this artwork
• Winter Solstice 1970 by Dame Barbara Hepworth View the main page for this artwork
• Harbour in Snow, La Rochelle 1938 by Sir William Nicholson View the main page for this artwork
• Claverton Street: Snow in Pimlico 1939 by Charles Ginner View the main page for this artwork
• Snow Scene 1946 by Ruskin SpearView the main page for this artwork
• -12 1956 by Alfred Manessier View the main page for this artwork
• DECEMBER Sheep Coming In 1976-7 by Peter Brook View the main page for this artwork
• Snow Night 1974 by Philip Greenwood - View the main page for this artwork
• Ski Hill 1997 by Peter Doig View the main page for this artwork
• Winter (trial proof) 1972 by David Leverett View the main page for this artwork

Frost Fair on the Thames 1683 #1

There are a number of paintings and etchings of Frost Fairs on the River Thames and elsewhere.  This painting is of the celebrated frost fair which occurred in the winter of 1683–84.   Titled Frost Fair on the Thames, with Old London Bridge in the distance, it was painted by an unknown artist in 1685 and is owned by the Yale Centre for British Art.

I've also found an etching of the same scene - also of unknown origin - but it does identify a number of the subjects in the scene.  You can find more versions at The 1683-4 frost fair

Looking at both the painting and engraving makes me wonder why more people don't paint accounts of contemporaneous events today - they're such wonderful records of both time and place!

Frost fair 1683-4

The temperature dropped severely at the beginning of December 1683.  The River Thames froze and remained frozen for nine weeks until early February 1684.   A road developed - called "Temple Street" between Temple Steps on the north bank of the Thames and Southwark on the south bank.  This road is what is portrayed in both painting and etching.  Booths and stalls developed along Temple Street to serve the people passing to and fro across the frozen river - and doubtless sight-seeing too!

John Evelyn, the diarist wrote, 

Coaches plied from Westminster to the Temple, and from several other stairs too and fro, as in the streets; sleds, sliding with skeetes, a bull-baiting, horse and coach races, puppet plays and interludes, cooks, tipling and other lewd places, so that it seemed to be a bacchanalian triumph, or carnival on the water.London: Portrait of a City. Hudson, Roger (1998). The Folio Society. 

Frost Fair on the Thames, with Old London Bridge in the distance (1685)
unknown artist, 17th century, British;
Formerly attributed to Jan Wyck, ca. 1645-1700, Dutch, active in Britain (from about 1664)
Oil on canvas | 25 1/4 x 30 1/4 inches (64.1 x 76.8 cm)
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection

I've taken the liberty of lightening the painting slightly - on the basis I don't believe any artist paints a scene of this sort do that it's dark - even if it has darkened with age.  On the Yale website, there is a fascinating set of images of the painting as it used to be and following treatment.

I also found an engraving of the exact same scene on Wikipedia.  I've cropped a large version of it to show more details included by the artist in the foreground.  Below this is the text at the bottom of the picture which tells you about all the things you can see in the engraving - and the painting! It seems very likely that the painting is based on this engraving.

The National Portrait Gallery identifies William Faithorne (1616 – 1691), English painter and engraver as the probably source of the engraving - he had a shop near Temple Bar.

The Thames Frost Fair, 1683
probably by William Faithorne, published by William Warter
line engraving, circa 1684
15 in. x 18 7/8 in. (380 mm x 480 mm) paper size

Crop of foreground of the Engraving of the Frost Fair 1683

The text at the top states

AN

Exact and lively Mapp

or

REPRESENTATION

Of Booths and all the varieties of showes and

Humours upon the ICE on the River of

THAMES by LONDON

During that memorable Frost in the 35th yeare

of the Reigne of his Sacred Maty

King CHARLES the 2d

ANNO Dni MDCLXXXIII.

With an Alphabetical Explanation of the

most remarkeable Figures

The text at the bottom provides an explanation of the alphabetical annotations

The Temple Staires with People goeing upon the Ice to Temple Street A.
The Duke of Yorke's Coffee house B.
The Tory Booth C.
The Booth with a Phoenix on it and Insured as long as the Foundation Stand D.
The Roast Beefe Booth E.
The halfe way house F.
The Beare garden Shire Booth G.
The Musick Booth H.
The Printing Booth I.
The Lottery Booth K.
The Horne Tavern Booth L.
The Temple garden with Crowds of People looking over the wall M.
The Boat drawne with a Hors N.
The Drum Boat O.
the Boat drawne upon wheeles P.
the Bull baiting Q.
The Chair sliding in the Ring R.
The Boyes Sliding S.
The Nine Pinn Playing T.
The sliding on Scates V.
The sledge drawing Coales from the other side of the Thames W.
The Boyes climbing upon the Tree in the Temple garden to see ye Bull Baiting X.
The Toy Shopps Y.
London Bridge Z.
Source for text: visual inspection, and verified from Bentley's Miscellany, Volume 9 by Charles Dickens, William Harrison Ainsworth, Albert Smith; publisher: Richard Bentley; year: 1841; page 133, footnote 1.

In the background is the Old London Bridge which was started in 1176 and completed in 1212.  Over the years properties were built on top of it (see below an etching of it just three years earlier).  The bridge and its buildings survived the great fire of 1666 due to a fire break at the northern end caused by a previous fire.

Drawing of London Bridge from a 1682 London MapSurveyed by: Morgan, William, d. 1690. Published: London, London Topographical Society, 1904

To the south of the Bridge was a gate where the heads of those executed for treason used to be put on spikes - with the head of William Wallace being the first to appear on the gate, in 1305.  This practice stopped in 1660 - just 25 years before this painting.

The church in the background of the frost fair painting is Southwark Cathedral which lies just to the west of London Bridge.  

The Frozen Thames - looking like the Arctic

It's been snowing here in London - so I thought I'd have a look at the pictures of Frost Fairs on the Thames.  The first one had me unpicking the trail of the story behind the painting both in terms of content and who painted it.

Here's the first one - it's a painting of The Frozen Thames, Looking Eastwards towards Old London Bridge, London - painted in 1677 by a painter I'd not heard of before - Abraham Hondius (1625–1691).

The Frozen Thames, Looking Eastwards towards Old London Bridge, London (1677) 
by Abraham Hondius
Oil on canvas, 107.8 x 175.6 cm
Museum of London
Abraham Hondius [Public domain or Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

The really interesting thing about this painting is that, according to the websites which have details about when the Thames froze, it didn't freeze on 1677!  In fact, it hadn't frozen for some years prior to this.

I'm wondering whether this painting is an imaginary interpretation of what the River Thames would look like if it froze.  This would account for why it looks so much like the Arctic(!) in his painting Arctic Adventure - also painted in 1677 (see below).  This latter painting is in the Fitzwilliam Museum.  Guess which painting I think was finished first!

Arctic Adventure (1677) Abraham Hondius
Oil on canvas, 55.4 x 84.7 cm
Fiztwilliam Museum

Hondius was a Dutch Golden Age artist who was noted for his portrayals of animals.  He moved to London in 1666 so this painting may very well have been a way of him bringing his work to the attention of collectors in London.

What's not obvious from the painting is the degree of devastation on one bank of the Thames at the time.  This is the year after the Great Fire of London and part of the City of London was wiped out (see an old map in the British Library of the impact of the Great Fire)

I'm very bothered by the church in the background.  In shape it looks like the old St Paul's Cathedral which had burnt down the previous year in Fire - but if the painting is looking east then it's on the wrong side of the Thames.  However if it's looking FROM the east then it makes sense and by definition must then be totally imaginary as the Cathedral no longer existed in 1667.

The Old St Paul's Cathedral in flames

The only church which was just beyond London Bridge at the time was St Thomas Church which now houses The Old Operating Theatre Museum - and which is totally the wrong shape.  (I should know - I used to work in the offices next door to it!)

You can watch a slideshow of 14 more paintings by Hondius on the Your Paintings website

These are the Museums and Art Galleries where you can see paintings by Hondius

Places to Paint: David Hockney and East Yorkshire

The Hockney Trail is a new website which provides an insight into all the places where David Hockney has been painting in East Yorkshire - and in particular those which can be seen in the David Hockney RA - The Bigger Picture exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts

This is a major contribution to the "places to paint" theme which I return to periodically on this blog.  If I can locate the place where John Singer Sargent painted a painting, then surely it's possible to do the same for a contemporary painter like Hockney?  This website would suggest that's the case.

The Hockney Trail website

It was also bound to happen - and, as it happens, this website has done the job rather well - BUT with a major caveat (see end).

The Hockney Trail provides:

• a Google Map of various locations where the paintings were painted.  
• details of which Ordnance Survey Maps cover the area
• details of where Hockney country is - and facilities in the area eg places to visit, eat and sleep
• details of various locations of Hockney paintings of East Yorkshire
• Kilham Road and the location of "Tracks into Wheatfields"
• the A166 - at the location for the painting "Garrowby Hill"
• the location for the painting of "Bugthorpe Valley"
• the location of the paintings of "Three Trees near Thixendale" - the paintings which you encounter - in all four seasons - as you enter the exhibition
• the location of "The Road to York Through Sledmere" (which is my version of the location of this Sledmere painting- done while sat with page 92 of the catalogue open in front of me!)

I made a few discoveries of my own.  First here are the locations I've found since reviewing the website

• this is the location of "The Tunnel" which is the subject of a number of the paintings in the exhibition - and also one of the films.  It's on the right of the Kilham Road to the west of Kilham, going towards Langtoft.  It's a long straight farmer's track between his fields

Hockney's Tunnel

David Hockney
A Closer Winter Tunnel, February - March, 2006
Oil on 6 canvases, 182 x 365 cm
Collection Art Gallery of New South Wales.
Purchased with funds provided by Geoff and Vicki Ainsworth, the Florence and William Crosby Bequest
and the Art Gallery of New South Wales Foundation 2007
Copyright David Hockney / Collection of Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney
Photo credit: Richard Schmidt

This is Woldgate and the location of Winter to Spring in Woldgate the major installation in the main Gallery at the RA (see yesterday's post Hockney: 51 iPad drawings on paper - Winter to Spring in Woldgate).  I estimate it's about 10 minutes from Hockney's house in Bridlington and is a brilliant spot to be able to get to quickly when the light looks good.

• Woldgate is an old Roman Road which runs between Bessingby Hill on the outskirts of Bridlington and the village of Kilham.  
• This is the Hockney Trail page for Woldgate.  

Woldgate

and this is one of the digital paintings Hockney did on his iPad in this location.

David Hockney
The Arrival of Spring in Woldgate, East Yorkshire in 2011 (twenty eleven) - 2 January
iPad drawing printed on paper
144.1 x 108 cm; one of a 52-part work
Courtesy of the artist
Copyright David Hockney

I have to confess this location hunting is addictive.  I think that's it for today - but I'll be back.......

The second thing I discovered yesterday is that East Yorkshire has the Wold Wide Web - with links to pages about all the villages in the Wolds.  How about that for an example of Yorkshire humour?

But how long will it be around?

My only query about the The Hockney Trail website is whether or not it's authorised.

It doesn't seem to have any sort of formal association with either the artist or any of the sponsors of the current exhibition at the Royal Academy.  I don't think it falls within the normal copyright exemptions for the use of Hockney images given the adverts which are visible in my other browser which doesn't block adverts (you're seeing the advert-free version - and I'd written most of this before I realised it had them!).

My current thoughts are that maybe the originator is well intentioned but maybe not aware of just how jealously the Hockney empire protects the copyright.  I think he might find somebody giving him the virtual tap on the shoulder sometime soon.  It would also appear that maybe the images of some paintings have already been taken down......

PS  I am by the way posting a scheduled post.  I'm actually currently sat in the RA having lunch with my sister after having just seen the exhibition for the third time!  Join the Friends of the RA and go as many times as you want - and take an adult family guest for free!


Links to related posts about Hockney and the exhibition:

• David Hockney RA talks about landscape painting
• Hockney: sketchbooks, iPad sketching and the Yosemite Valley
• Hockney: 51 iPad drawings on paper - Winter to Spring in Woldgate
• MAKING A MARK: Review: David Hockney RA - A Bigger Picture 17 Jan 2012
• MAKING A MARK: Review: David Hockney - A Bigger Picture 02 Jul 2009

Hockney: 51 iPad drawings on paper - Winter to Spring in Woldgate

SkyNews have produced the first video film I've seen which provides a good view of the printed iPad landscapes of East Yorkshire as drawn by David Hockney - which can be seen in the David Hockney RA - The Bigger Picture exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts

The two rows of large "paintings" on three sides of the largest of the Academy’s Galleries (Gallery 3) are 51 iPad drawings printed on paper.  These together with an oil on thirty-two canvases comprise the installation titled ‘The Arrival of Spring on Woldgate, East Yorkshire in 2011 (Twenty-Eleven)’

It's a sequence of paintings from the beginning of January 2011 through to early June 2011 - and shows the movement from the winter landscape through to the spring landscape.



A lot of the iPad drawings are done along the same road which features in a lot of the paintings

Woldgate is a narrow lane that runs from Bessingby Hill on the outskirts of Bridlington to the village of Kilham which is 7 miles away. It was on this road that David Hockney observed many different seasons and recorded what he saw using his iPad and on canvas with paints.
Woldgate

I'm taking my sister to see the exhibition tomorrow - it will be my third visit!  See Making A Mark - Review: David Hockney RA - A Bigger Picture

MIDNIGHT OPENINGS: 'David Hockney RA: A Bigger Picture' is now open until midnight on Fridays and Saturdays

See also:

• Making A Mark: How to produce a large 300dpi TiFF print of an iPad sketch
• Making A Mark Reviews: Product review: A stylus for iPad sketching #1

Remnant Snow - Winter Landscapes #1

Remnant by Casey Klahn
small pastel

This is a pastel painting of a remnant of snow by Casey Klahn (The Colorist).

Casey does fabulous landscapes in pastels and has been juried into exhibitions by the Pastel Society of America.

He also produces some of the most epic photographs of snow I see each winter (he lives in the north of Washington State near the border with Canada!).  Here's one from last year round about this time - which includes the route to his studio. he has to break in when the door freezes shut!

This artwork first appeared in this post Remnant - and came complete with musical accompaniment.

How to get your paintings of Winter posted on this blog
If you are

1. active in blogging about your art 
2. you're interested in having your images displayed as part of the seasonal changes. 

then all you have to do is

• drop me a line (see side column for email) with a brief explanation about your painting (if this is not already in your blog post), 
• identify and reference the URL of the blog post in which I can see the painting 
• and (this is important) use Readers Winter Landscapes in the subject line of your email (This is so I can find it in the masses I get each day!) 

Places to Paint: This blog features and shares good places for painters to paint. Please note that I'm also interested in the place as well as what led you to paint it in Winter. Tell me if and why other painters might be interested in this place.

I can't promise to display all that I'm told about. Plus there is an absolute rule which is that this is for art bloggers only ie "no blog post, no feature on my blog".


[Note - the count in the title only applies to the winter landscapes submitted by art bloggers]

Winter Landscapes by Ivan Shiskin

Winter (1890) by Ivan Shiskin
Oil on canvas, 125.5 x 204 cm
State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg | Source: Wikimedia Commons

The great Russian landscape painter, Ivan Shiskin (1838-1892) very much liked painting trees and became famous for his forest landscapes.  These are a couple of his paintings of pine trees laden with snow in winter

I'm minded to try and develop an educational resource website about Shiskin over the course of the winter months.  I've not studied any Russian landscape artists yet although I have seen their paintings - some of which I like a lot.

Who are the artists which you think are great painters of winter landscapes?

Who else do you rate highly as a painter of trees?

Which Russian landscape painters do you like?

In the wild north (1891) by Ivan Shiskin
161 x 118 cm, oil on canvas
Kiev Museum of Ukranian Art, Kiev, Ukraine

Winter Landscapes

Street in Winter: sunlight and snow (1872) by Camille Pissaro

I'm about to start a series of  posts on this blog about Winter Landscapes.  This will be a mixture of artwork by famous artists and by art bloggers who read this blog.  Most will be paintings - but they can also be fine art prints or drawings.

Some will be full of snow and ice - but not everybody has snow and ice and sometimes that's a bit more of a challenge!  I'm interested in paintings which communicate about winter whichever part of the world you are in.

The painting above is by Camille Pissaro and captures three aspects which I find very characteristic of winter - the low piercing sunshine, trees without leaves - and the slush!

Pissaro's work is characterised as being Impressionist.  He was also influenced by two great French landscape painters Gustave Courbet and Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot.

How to get your paintings of Winter posted on this blog

If you are

1. active in blogging about your art
2. you're interested in having your images displayed as part of the seasonal changes. 

then all you have to do is

• drop me a line (see side column for email) with a brief explanation about your painting (if this is not already in your blog post), 
• identify and reference the URL of the blog post in which I can see the painting 
• and (this is important) use Readers Winter Landscapes in the subject line of your email (This is so I can find it in the masses I get each day!)

Places to Paint: This blog features and shares good places for painters to paint.  Please note that I'm also interested in the place as well as what led you to paint it in Winter.  Tell me if and why other painters might be interested in this place.

I can't promise to display all that I'm told about. Plus there is an absolute rule which is that this is for art bloggers only ie "no blog post, no feature on my blog".

Places to Paint - Maine

Slack Tide (oil on panel 16" x 12")- by Kevin Mizner

Recently I came across the work of Kevin Mizner and his blog Maine-ly Painting  

This Blog draws on my over thirty years of experience painting the beauty of Maine. I'll have some pointers, comments and even criticisms on art.

I was impressed with his work - his landscapes and seascapes of Maine - and the way he wrote about art and the places he painted.  I've been to Maine and sketched in Maine and I'd have loved to have had somebody provide me with a guide to the places to paint.  So I decided to ask him to write a guest post for this blog about his favourite places to paint in Maine - and this is it!

________________________

Maine has been a destination for artists for nearly one hundred-fifty years. Why? It's all about the light. 

Maine sits rather high in the Northern Hemisphere, at about the same latitude as Spain, and a little south of the UK, which gives it a raking, angular light. Any artist will tell you that an angled light gives a more vibrant glow to colors than a more direct, straight overhead light.

But in addition to the angle of the sun, Maine juts out into the Atlantic Ocean. Maine has salty, moist air, infusing the light with a radiant shimmering glow. Combine that quality of light with Maine's three thousand miles of rocky coastline, replete with quiet harbors, fishing villages and a few sandy beaches, and it's small wonder artists flock here to paint.

The artists who've painted here are a veritable Who's Who of the greatest ever: Frederick Church, Thomas Moran, Winslow Homer, Robert Henri, Andrew Wyeth, Rockwell Kent, and John Singer Sargent, to name but a few.

Monhegan

One of the more popular spots in Maine to paint is the small island of Monhegan.

Monhegan is a spit of rock about two miles long and half-mile wide, but it has breath-taking views at almost every turn. The only way to get there is by ferry. Once you're on the island, be prepared to walk, as no vehicles are allowed - other than the beat up trucks used by the year-round Lobstermen population.

Acadia National Park

Summer in Acadia (oil on panel 11" x 14") by Kevin Mizner

The next great spot is Acadia National Park.

Acadia may be one of America's smallest National Parks, but it is spectacular, none the less. Located on the ten-mile wide Mount Desert Island, it is the only spot on the east coast where the mountains meet the sea.

Kevin's favourite place to paint in Maine - Harpswell

What is my personal favorite Maine spot? Harpswell, Maine.

Located about thirty miles north-east of Portland, Harpswell is an accumulation of small villages and islands on Maine's mid-coast. Of all the spots along the coast, it is the most unspoiled.

Photograph of Mackerel Cove

Orr's and Bailey Island's offer gorgeous views of the coast that rival Monhegan's.  Mackeral Cove on Bailey Island is in my opinion, one of the most picturesque spots on the coast!

A part of Harpswell, and my home for four years, is Cundy's Harbor. "Cundy's", as we locals call her, is one of Maine's authentic working water fronts-- no condos in sight. It's harbor is chocked full of lobster boats and trawlers, the shore has quaint wooden-piling wharfs jutting out to service the boats.

Cundy's Harbor In Light Fog (oil on panel 11x14) by Kevin Mizner

Huddled on either side of the one road into (and out of) town are old New England Cape Cod style homes that have weathered the harsh seasons for one hundred or more years. I have travelled the state from stem to stern, and Cundy's Harbor is the quintessential Maine coastal fishing village.

Other places of note:

• Vinalhaven Island in Penobscot Bay. 
• Portland Head Light and Two Lights State Park in Cape Elizabeth.  One can stand on Crescent Beach in Cape Elizabeth and see Prout's Neck-- the home of Winslow Homer. He even painted at Crescent Beach. 

In the footsteps of the Artists

I've mentioned Monhegan, but Baxter State Park in northern Maine has Mount Katahdin, a favorite spot of the great Frederick Church.

Any fan of Andrew Wyeth knows he summered and painted in Maine. Travel along Route 1 to Thomaston, and head out to Cushing, Bristol and Friendship and you'll be trodding the same ground "Andy" walked as he made his masterpieces.

John Singer Sargent painted in Acadia (eg Sand Beach, Schooner Head)

Edward Hopper painted one of the lighthouses at Two Lights Park in Cape Elizabeth (now in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art)

And Kevin Mizner painted in all those places...

The best time to visit

Finally, when is the best time to visit?

If you want to watch and paint the lobstermen and eat some good lobster, come in summer. If you want to see the spectacular foliage of the maples and birches, come in the fall. If snow scenes and some skiing are your cup of tea, come in winter.

Winter Light Cundy's Harbor by Kevin Mizner

Spring for us is called "mud season" and for a good reason! All that melting snow, and bare grey branches are not worthy of painting in the slightest. Unless you're Willard Metcalf. Oh, he painted in the western mountains of Maine near Bethel.

So there you have it. My ideas on what's good to paint and see in Maine! I hope this works for you, and if you would like anything more in way of information, paintings or photos, please don't hesitate to let me know.

This is the latest in a series of posts about Places to Paint.  If you're interested in contributing a guest post click this link to find out what you need to do.

Links:

• Kevin Mizner 
• website Kevin Mizner Fine Art: Landscapes and Seascapes
• blog - Maine-ly Painting
• Travels with a Sketchbook in....... Maine: blog posts relating to these sketches
• Thursday 21st September:  In the footsteps of Winslow Homer - nearly!
• Friday 22nd September: Pemaquid Lighthouse - from top to bottom
• Saturday 23rd September: The Farnsworth, the Wyeths and the rain
• Sunday 24th September: The interior of the Quaker Tavern B&B

Winter Landscape: Kinryusan Temple at Asakusa by Ando Hiroshige

Hiroshige was an artist of snow and rain 

This, for me, is one of the "all time great" winter landscapes of an urban area under snow. It was created by the famous Japanese ukiyo-e artist Ando Hiroshige (1797-1858) as part of the series One Hundred Famous Views of Edo which was produced between 1856-8.  This one is Image #99.

Kinryusan Temple at Asakusa by Ando Hiroshige (Japanese, 1797–1858)

From the series One Hundred Famous Views of Edo (JP2519)
Oban format, woodblock print; ink and color on paper;
H. 14 1/16 in. (35.7 cm), W. 9 1/2 in. (24.1 cm)

In Timeline of Art History. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. (October 2006)

Here, a large lantern and a temple gate are so closely viewed that motifs are cropped, while the use of one-point perspective, a Western technique, to depict the pathway to the main hall of Kinryusan temple contrasts the powerful details of the foreground with the inexorability of the temple hall in the distance.

Source: Ando Hiroshige: Kinryusan Temple at Asakusa: From the series One Hundred Famous Views of Edo (JP2519) | Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History | The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Note also that:

• all the people are turned away from the artist; many are further obscured by umbrellas
• the leaden sky is captured perfectly - but the colour is also 'reflected' at the base of the painting
• the red vertical of the doorway is echoed by the vertical banner and the tiered tower in the rear of the image
• the terrific contrast between the red and the green of the buildings and the white and blue/grey of the natural elements - the snow and the sky - making this a very "look at me" image.

You can read more about the landscapes of Hiroshige and the One Hundred Views of Edo in my information site Hiroshige - Resources for Art Lovers

You can see more snow scenes by Hiroshige on John Stewart's excellent website about The Woodblock Prints of Ando Hiroshige

• Twelve Snows Scenes of the Eastern Capital
  
• Eight Snow Scenes of the Eastern Metropolis
  

Bill Guffey paints a winter landscape plein air (video)

This is a two hour plein air painting session in January by Bill Guffey reduced to eight minutes.  He's painting a winter landscape of woods and water in the snow.

Quick two hour painting effort
at Salem Park in Cumberland County, Kentucky
on January 22, 2011. Oil on oil primed linen panel

If you have published a painting video of you painting plain air do let me know.

Winter Landscape: Hunters in the snow by Pieter Bruegel the Elder

Hunters in the Snow is the very first painting I ever saw by Pieter Bruegel.  It was of course a reproduction and it hung on one of the walls of my primary school.

Jäger im Schnee (Winter) (Hunters in the Snow) 1565 by Pieter Bruegel the Elder (1525 - 1569)
Oil on panel; 46 1/8 x 63 7/8 in. (117 x 162 cm)
Source: Pieter Bruegel the Elder (ca. 1525/30–1569) | Thematic Essay | Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History | The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

I loved to look at it.

First of all, it was about a snowy landscape - which is a source of great excitement to a child living in a temperate climate where the rain rarely changed to snow

Next it had such a lot going on in the picture.  You could look at it for a long time and still keep seeing new things.  I always used to think the hunters themselves seemed a bit miserable - and that all the fun was happening out on the ice.  This from the perspective of a child whose greatest excitement if it snowed was to make an ice slide and see how far I could slide and stay standing up!

Looking at it again now, what I'm struck by is:

• How cold the picture is in terms of the colours used.  The sky has that leaden grey look associated with times of heavy snow.  The snow itself is pristine and white suggesting that not only has it snowed but also that it snows on a regular basis.
• It has a feeling of a life lived in the snow for a long time.  The rooves of the buildings have a pitch associated with areas of heavy snow.  Lots of people are skating - because lots of people can skate!
• How the posture of the hunters is very persuasive of a feeling of weariness and possibly melancholy.  These people really do look like they are trudging through heavy snow and have been for quite some time.  Also, although they are hunters, they don't seem to have been successful in batching very much.
• the composition and design of the painting is intriguing.  In one sense, it's very westernised with the main figures entering from the bottom left.  There are a number of diagonals coming in from the left which all serve to focus on the skaters in the middle of the painting.  the bird and the curve in the mountain create a loop which prevent our eyes escaping out the top of the painting.  Small figures make us want to linger and make out what they are doing. 
• the colour palette is very limited and very restrained.  However the painting employs complementary colours - the reddish brown and the blue/green/grey of the sky are opposite one another on a colour wheel.
• how competent Bruegel is at creating living beings through silhouettes.

The painting is part of the permanent collection of the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna.  The Picture Gallery was developed from the art collection created by the House of Habsburg.  It is one of the more important collections of European paintings in the world and focuses on paintings between the fifteenth and eighteenth centuries.

This is what the museum has to say about it

The group of hunters returns to the low-lying village, accompanied by an exhausted pack of dogs. Only a single fox hangs on one of the spears slung over the men's shoulders. To the left preparations are afoot to singe a pig over an open fire. Delightful details such as skaters on frozen ponds have added to the picture's enormous popularity. Yet it is not the sum total of details that make the picture important, rather its overall effect. In a manner both virtuosic and consistent, Breugel evokes the impression of permanent cold.

Bruegel also painted landscape in different seasons - and I'll return to him and his paintings as I feature landscapes from the different seasons in the coming year.

Winter Landscapes - Icy Winter by George Gardner Symons

For the next few posts, I'm going to take the opportunity to highlight, for our wider appreciation, some paintings of landscapes in winters by artists from different countries, different continents, different centuries and different painting styles.

 Icy Winter by George Gardner Symons
oil on canvas, 101.6 cm (40 in.), Width: 76.2 cm (30 in.)

This first one is by an artist who seems to have been completely besotted by snow.  George Gardner Symons (1861-1930) is an American impressionist artist who specialised in winter landscapes.  He died in January 1930 aged 64. 

You can appreciate a range of his winter landscapes here.  What I particularly like about them is

• the vantage points and compositions which suggest to me a man who liked to find the best spot rather than the one easiest to paint from. 
• the colours he finds in snow

Symons’ exposure to Impressionism in Europe has a lasting influence on his work. He painted “en plein air” and his is generally classified as an “American Impressionist”. Though he is noted in particular for his scenes of New England in the Winter, he is considered a member of the California School of American Impressionism.

Wherever he painted, Symons rendered his landscapes in clear, strong compositions, with a vibrant color sense, and the kind of crisp, deliberate brushwork that makes the work of so many American Impressionist painters wonderfully appealing.

Lines and Colors

Other references include:

• Artcyclopedia - George Gardner Symons Online
• Artnet - George Gardner Symons
• Lines and Colors - George Gardner Symons which provides an excellent resume of his painting career