Earlier this year, I tried to paint a few landscapes and they all ended up being wiped off the panel.  I felt like I had completely forgotten how to paint a landscape, which was strange because that’s where I started.  I think it had more to do with the fact that I was growing in other areas artistically.  The light in this house had pushed me in a new direction with my still-life paintings and I could see how much I was improving.  When I switched over to paint a landscape, it would feel flat and forced and I wasn’t happy with the results.

So, I dove into studying and practicing.  I’ve been reading books, observing nature through photos and sketching, and I’m taking a few new art classes focusing on the landscape, trees, and skies.  (I took or am taking online classes from Erin Spencer, Julie Davis, and Scot Christenson.)

In the class I took with Julie Davis, who is masterful at capturing trees, she shared that she studied trees for an entire year.  A year!  I mean, I looked at her paintings and thought, Julie’s just really good at painting trees.  And that’s true.  She is.  But she is because she focused all of her studies on it for an entire year of her life.  She read books about painting trees and even about trees in general.  Books of poetry about trees.  And she studied trees.  She drew them, painted them, and took pictures of them.  It was helpful to learn from her and watch her process, but that was probably the biggest takeaway.  She didn’t become a master at painting trees by just painting a few trees.  She did a deep dive and achieved wonderful results.

Both Julie and Scot Christenson shared some artists they like who were new to me.  Well, I love new-to-me artists, so I can start researching their work and see if there is a good book showcasing their paintings.  This has led me down a rabbit trail of Australian, American, and Canadian Impressionists.  Now, in addition to new-to-me artists, I have some new-to-me art books and I have really enjoyed them.  I’ll usually carry one into the family room with me in the evening and I’ll flip through them, doing some quick sketches, making notes, and marking pages I want to revisit.

One of my favorite newly-discovered artists is William Wendt.  He painted the prettiest greens with expressive brushwork.  The book, is a beautiful book showcasing his work.

And I love that he names his paintings things like “I Lift Mine Eyes unto the Hills.”  He had me at his chunky clouds, too.

I was drawn to Sydney Long’s work because of his trees.  is a great book on this Australian artist.  It includes more than just his landscapes, but his landscapes are lovely.  There are woodland nymph sorts of situations, too, as in the cover, but that’s not the main thrust of the book.

Looking into the Australian Impressionists lead me to Arthur Streeton.  Sometimes, I find a painting I’m really excited about and I try to find a book on the artist and I’m disappointed to come up empty or not find a good option.  Sometimes the books are small, have poor reviews, or are ridiculously expensive.  so, I was thrilled when I found a gloriously large and comprehensive.

I also bought a book on California Impressionism that is excellent, but I forgot to take a picture of it for this post.  If you’re interested, it’s .  A book that kept me busy for quite a while, though, was Impressionism in Canada.  While the book features Canadian impressionists, it also covers French and American impressionism and how the movement traveled around the globe.

There are so many amazing artists featured, but it does tell the broader story of the impressionist movement and how persistent the artists had to be to get their work recognized and to find their audience.  Monet, Renoir, Pissarro & Sisley shipped paintings over to Canada for an impressionist art show, and not one of the paintings sold.  They were all shipped back to France.  It’s such a good reminder that not everyone is going to understand or like what you do.

A measure of how much I love a book is how much it’s marked.  I used to mark pages with bits of paper or with sticky flags, but I discovered book darts in a used book I bought a couple of years ago and they are wonderful!  They don’t kink the pages or stick up and get crinkled.  They just beautifully mark the page.  You can buy book darts .

As you can see, I loved these books and have a lot of pages to revisit.

And here is a peek at the notebook I’m keeping to study landscapes, trees, skies, and the works of artists I like…

It’s been fun putting it together and I’m looking forward to filling it and using it as a resource.

Today, I varnished paintings from Monday’s sale (thank you!) and did a little bit of studio housekeeping.  I cleaned my palettes and got things together to pack a plein air bag for painting outside.  May has been wet, cold, and miserable so far, but I’m sure that will change soon enough.

You can find a list of my growing art book collection HERE.

You can find more book reviews HERE.