Today the sun came out after a somewhat overcast morning sky and, after various Saturday must-do’s were done, it seemed like the right time to go find horses to paint. I went for the first time in many years to a certain nearby park and before too long discovered I had truly overachieved. After sketching out the scene on my paper, I realized a major equestrian event was about to start literally right around me.
Illustration: “Frying Pan Park,” Watercolor, gouache, and ink by Black Elephant Blog author (2019)
Riders on beautiful horses waited their turn just a few feet away, and judges, photographers and a large audience were perched on a hill below some trees to my left. I couldn’t have planned this better since I arrived just beforehand. Fortunately my spot next to some conveniently large and flat rocks was not in anyone’s way. I managed to focus on the scenery and capture some of the horses and riders warming up on lower field before the big competition. The spring colors of the trees and fields were striking, but I also tried to capture some of the scene right in front of me. As usual, the master works of such scenes that I know best (from Degas or Dufy, for instance), are in oil paint, not watercolor, and I am thinking to try an oil painting of this scene before too long. Drawing horses can be difficult but the style of Raoul Dufy is quite loose and freeing, and that is probably what I’ll try next as an experiment.
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