Bear Bear Bear

This post was written awhile back but for some reason it never posted.

I'm  being inspired by bears we watched last spring in Waterton Lakes National Park. It was a wonderful chilly drizzly windy with periods of sunshine kinda week spent admiring the remote beauty as mountains drifted in and out of sight amongst rain clouds. I love Southern Alberta landscapes where the rolling hills blend up to the mountains. The exception being constant gusting wind everyday, the constant howl does tend to drive one a wee bit crazy after a while.

Though Grizzly were spotted at higher elevations we pretty much stayed to the lower levels aside from one bitter cold windy rainy afternoon at Cameron Lake. We partially hiked the lakeside trail looking for glacier lilies and thankfully found two of the yellow beauties not too far along the trail as we really were not prepared for the extreme wind chill so headed back to the boat rental place to warm up.

With the experience ingrained in my spirit and diverse reference photos to work from I composed a few more bear paintings after finishing "Watching the Hikers" Acrylic, on wrapped canvas, 16x24 inches

"Masked Cinnamon Bear in Wildflower Meadow" 

Acrylic on wrapped canvas, 16x16 inches

I love the face of cinnamon bear as it was dark like a mask. I may at some point do a closer up view of its face but for these paintings the bears are in natural habitat and I want to maintain the impression of being viewed in the wilds, not close up photo-realistic as I tend to do. When out viewing we see form and shape and how light hits that form with contrasted dark shadow. Sometimes the animal is close enough and the light is just right to see their eyes but mostly not. Its more an experience. Excitement increases the adrenaline while almost silent exclamations escape the lips as we breathe out, all the while breathing in the moment, the beauty, the Wow of creation that we are but a tiny part of.

"Rocky Mountain Black Bear"

Acrylic on wrapped canvas, 10 x14 inches

This bear had the most black glossy coat, so shinny and rich looking that I struggled to achieve the look I wanted to portray. Did I get it?

There is one more on the drawing board of a bear I called Saddle Blanket. We watched Saddle Blanket and his/her mom traverse across an open meadow grubbing for roots and bulbs one eve at dusk. The light was fast receding behind the mountain but we were able to watch them for about ten minutes through our camera lens before them ambled over the hilltop out of view. Yes I view distant wildlife through a 300 prime lens; sure wish I could afford a pair of quality binoculars but with limited funds I make do with what I have.

Was it not complete?

Was it complete? Well no. When I'm not satisfied with the overall look I can't help myself but to jump back in with paint on brush and make changes. At this point in a painting it can go two ways, worse or better. I am happy with all the hours, days that added up to a months worth of work that this painting improved with the extra days work.

this is the last image I posted which at this point I let the painting rest for a week then took another good look at it. Though it probably was good enough, I could see where it could be pushed further and strengthened by adding more darks into shadow areas and scumbling color into the foreground to integrate it into the rest of the painting.

This is the completed painting of "Watching the Hikers" it has since rested for over a week and I see no areas that leave me troubled. Done and ready to sign and get an isolation coat painted on to protect the image from dust.

Have a wonderful day.

Waterton National Park Bear Painting in acrylic from start to finish.

I love bears and I love watching and painting them. Last spring we camped in Waterton to study bears as they grazed on the open mountainside meadows. In all we were blessed with seeing about eight different bears and the meadows were abundant with a blaze of colorful blossoms.

 Mostly I paint tightly with high detail so this time I made a conscious decision to paint in a looser style. Instead of doing a highly detailed drawing onto canvas I only noted the bear and the mountains basic outline with a bit of detail to keep me on track. Keeping with the notion for my brush strokes to have more freedom I painted standing up, normally I sit while painting. Mixing a good quantity of acrylic gel into the paints brushed on with a one inch brush in a very loose manner to cover the canvas gives an initial color tone.

 The next step was to mix color with less gel though still keeping the colors washy yet darker tone shaping the forms with paint. The colors are Liquitex Cadmium red med hue, cadmium yellow light hue and Ultramarine blue (green shade) as well as titanium white mixed in to shape the moody spring sky that blends into the snow ridges on the mountain. I always use quality paints and high quality canvas to work on. It costs more but is well worth the extra dollars spent.

 Adding more paint and less gel the painting advances as more detail is added. Greens are all made up of blends of Cadmium yellow and ultramarine blue with varying touches of red to tone and mute some areas.

 I now push the paintbrush flowers with vivid pure strokes of cad red & cad yellow and add white to ultramarine to define the blue flower shapes.

 Passages of gray tones are created using the primary colors to add depth to effectively push the lighter mountains back into the distance. With a touch of burt sienna into the ultramarine the foreground is glazed to tone down some areas and some of the paintbrush flowers are toned down.

 The completed painting converted to black and white on the computer to check tonal balance.

The painting is complete, at least at this point I believe it to be. I will leave off painting at this point and see how I like it a week from now. Sometimes I get too close to a piece and don't see the flaws till later so its best to leave it alone and work on the next. Actually I work on up to three paintings at a time  bouncing back and forth between them. If I get stuck on what to do next I switch to another to keep the momentum going, well thats the theory if alls going well. This painting which is 16x 20 inches took about one week to produce. Title which came to me as I was painting is "Watching the Hikers"