Saturday, November 5, 2011

Heavenly Morning

"Heavenly Morning" 18" x 24" Oil on canvas

This scene is from a location in Pagosa Springs while I was there for the Rocky Mountain Plein Air Painters National Show. The river is the East Fork River that snaked it's way through a canyon and then came out into this open area. I came on this scene around 6:30 in the morning. The clouds were low and just starting to dissolve as the warmth of the morning sun increased. The glow of the mountain was peaking through those clouds displaying the start of a new day as the sun's light bathed the mountain. The experience was just a split moment in time and like most staggering beauty, lasts but a few moments. It was long enough to get off a couple of frames with my camera. I painted a sketch from those photos, and then ended up with this studio painting trying to capture the romance and calm of what looked to me to be Heaven  on Earth.