Eagle Plein Air Festival Weekend

This is me at Katherine Albertson Park last Sunday. Taken by a friend of a friend without me knowing, although I do not think I could have struck a better pose if I knew someone was taking my picture.

I am a watercolor painter and have not painted in oils in many years. I have all the plein air stuff though, and have regularly hauled it around thinking I am going to start painting plein air and then I don't even open the box. I finally used the Eagle Plein Air Festival to help me get over that hurdle of playing with oils again and trying painting plein air. If you don't know, plein air means "open air". It is hard, and not for everyone, but it teaches a painter how to be fast and plan a painting well from the start. More than two hours and your light changes so much that if you try to keep changing your work to keep up, you will ruin it. Like I did about an hour after this picture was taken. I got over that hurdle, though!