Lean-to
Posted: January 19, 2022 Filed under: Uncategorized 59 CommentsIn the woods near my house, someone has been constructing these makeshift lean-to shelters. They appear and disappear from month to month, and I wonder who the architect is. They’re quite beautiful, especially in winter. I painted this quite large (Arches CP 16″ x 20″) because I wanted to include all the details that make the overlapping branches so interesting. It’s a little more detailed than my usual way of working, but the subject seemed to require that.
You have beautifully and expertly captured this winter scene. Very inspiring!
Laura, thanks so much.
Absolutely gorgeous! I love your winter scenes but this one takes the cake. It is stunning.
Bernadette, thank you so much! I had fun with this one.
I’d say influenced by Etienne-Joseph Gaboury but he was influenced by something like this originally.
Interesting. I was thinking more like Andy Goldsworthy, although a little messier.
Yep, sure looks like a lean-to, Certainly has to be humad-made, or a very bright ‘Canadian Monkey.’
Definitely Canadian!
More great work Shari, congrats!
Bill, thank you!
This is so…luminous! I’m taking your online course right now, Sketching Boats: Simple Solutions for a Complex Scene, so I’m thinking about how aspects of that strategy would work for complex subjects like your beautiful winter scenes. This is really something, so much color in those branches.
Kathryn, thanks for having a look, and for taking the courses! The simplification and limited palette I teach in the Sketching Boats course would definitely be applicable in this scene.
You can make even a bunch of branches a beautiful painting!!! Thank you for sharing with us!!
Thanks for having a look Audrey!
Many, many years ago when I was a kid in Michigan I would make lean-to’s in the winter in the nearby forest. No reason, kids don’t need a reason.
So true Rene.
This is beautiful, Shari. The way you painted each individual branch–it’s a beauty!
Thanks Lois!
Lovely!
Thanks Marsha!
So simple and beautiful!!!!
Thanks Gretta.
Your winter scenes, especially with the sunlight are the BEST! Thanks for sharing
Thanks Tami!
This is a beautiful rendering Shari and lovely placement of the quinn golds (?).
How wonderful to come across such whimsy in your daily walks, in the bleak midwinter…..very happy-making I’m sure.
That same little forest that I walk through every day has given me so much to paint. If you saw it you would wonder how because it’s so small, but it is indeed a little spot that makes me happy.
This is a really pretty painting.
Thank you Sandi!
Shari, your winter paintings are wonderful! This one is more detailed- I wouldn’t even know where to start, all those branches! Love it!
Thanks Linda. In terms of where to start, I think I painted the shadows on the snow first.
It is lovely!
Thanks Cindy!
So beautiful Shari! I love your shadows and the snow looks so lucious. What is the color or mix you have been using for shadows and snow?
Thanks Marilyn. I’ve been using the same mix for snow for a long time. Cobalt + Cerulean + a bit of Quin Rose or Alizarin.
Hi Shari, we have then here in my local woods in Surrey, UK , too. Someone starts one, people add to it then someone starts another one nearby and the branches gradually get moved to the new one day by day! They’re not covered in snow though!
Joyce, I love that idea of collaboration. Perhaps that’s what’s happened here too.
Hi Shari
I love the mauve colours you’ve used in this painting. On the matter of the lean to shelters – check out YouTube on this one if you’re curious. The Sasquatch/Bigfoot build structures like this throughout America and Canada in wooded/forested areas. There is plenty of video footage regarding this.
Cheers Ian ________________________________
Ian, I will certainly check this out!
This is very like the structures my now-adult step-sons built in the woods around their chldhood home. Here and there one will appear when walking through the woods, sparking fond reminiscence for their father.
Gigi, I suspect these were built by neighbourhood teens who go to the woods to hang out in the evenings. But I have yet to see anyone building one of these. I guess I don’t venture into the woods at night : )
Shari, I really like this painting. Great color and texture in these trees & branches.
Thank you!!! It is interesting that yesterday I happened to visit one of your paintings of trees
in winter — the one with the old wire fence.
Thanks so much Susie. I really got lost in the branches on this one.
Can’t stop staring at this one. Amazing.What was your palette?
Thanks Judy. I’ve been using the same mix for snow for a long time. Cobalt + Cerulean + a bit of Quin Rose or Alizarin. I also used some Quin Burnt Orange.
Shari, your winter scenes are beautiful! Thank you for sharing.
Thanks so much Connie. You know I love painting winter.
Beautiful work here Shari, so glad I have your winter tutorial to work on soon.
Thanks Gail!
I like how the collection of branches gives a strong movement to the left when most of the trees lean slightly right. This is really lovely. Great shadows too!
Joan, that’s exactly what I loved about the composition when I saw it in the woods.
It gives me such pleasure to see your work show up in my email box. Thank you, and hugs!
Thanks so much for having a look Cat!
Wow, just wow. What wonderful soft colors you have pulled from the winter woods. I also love how you captured the bluish tones of the branches in shadow.
This is a beauty! Love the detail and colors. It really paid off!! Thanks!
Must be the same folks who build driftwood shelters on the beaches in Oregon (there I think it’s too make windbreaks!). I love how you handled the branches!
How beautiful and so three-dimensional!
Thanks Lynn!
I loved seeing your drawing and paint layers on your instagram story. Would love to see them recorded here.
Thanks Martha! Maybe one of these days I will do a step-by-step.