Cannon Beach Oil Painting Workshop

beach paintings

Strengthen your Visual Sensitivity and Creative Visual Language
This workshop is designed to explore the fundamental reasons behind a painting's success as you create your own masterpiece
Class is March 26, 27 and 28
10 AM to 4 PM daily

Think of walking into a gallery and instantly being grabbed by a painting from clear across the room. What is it that reaches out to you and pulls you to get a better look? Learn what it is that first draws you in and how the painting continues to cast such a spell that you have to get within sniffing distance to learn all you can.

Through informative conversations and step-by-step demonstrations, students will gain an understanding of the interrelated components of painting- including value, shape, color, and edge relationship. You'll be painting right alongside artist Michael Orwick. Each of you will be given personal attention and friendly critiques.

Michael will also discuss the benefits and drawbacks of photo references. He will provide some reference material for you, but you are encouraged to bring your own landscape photos to paint. Michael will emphasize emotion, color, composition, and ways to turn a photo into a spirited painting.

Starting with composition, emphasis will be placed on editing and selection skills as well as clarifying light effects for strong, personal design. You’ll study the power and importance of balance, unity, variety, interest and contrast through the tonal and color aspects of your paintings.

As a student, you will also learn about mixing colors from a limited palette while still achieving dynamic light and shadow effects with lively color. You’ll discover how values and temperature work to keep your paintings in harmony.

Take home your own light filled masterpiece along with improved painting methods and theory.

To learn more about this fantastic art town and lodging options please visit
http://www.cannonbeach.org/

On Saturday after class (4:30-5:30) a special reception with appetizers and wine is being offered free of charge at Dragonfire gallery for this group.

Bonus: Get ready for painting outdoors with a Plein-air equipment overview and suggestions list.
Also weather permitting I invite you join me before and after class to paint the magic of Haystack rock in plein air.

To learn more about the artist, instructor www.michaelorwick.com
Class is March 26, 27 and 28
10 AM to 4 PM daily.
We are meeting at the Cannon Beach Chamber of Commerce building in the beautiful Chamber Hall
207 N Spruce St
Cannon Beach, OR 97110
(503) 436-2623

To learn more about this fantastic art town and lodging options please visit
http://www.cannonbeach.org/

To sign up for the workshop
Please contact the fantastic folks at Dragonfire Gallery
Eeva, Lotta, and Marsha
DragonFire Gallery
PO BX 1010 (USPS)
123 SOUTH HEMLOCK ST (ups)
Cannon Beach, OR 97110
www.dragonfirestudio.com
503 436 1533

Tuition is just $250 for all three days and the special reception, for those in town for less time there is an open option of $100 per day.

Oil Painting Supply List Please email Michael at orwickillustration@comcast.net or contact Dragonfire gallery, or go to http://michaelorwick.com/dataviewer.asp?keyvalue=6698&page=Journals


http:www.michaelorwick.com

What a crazy painting project

These are the final images done for the new Lebaon Library, my friend Aarron Woods made a great little video about the process.

Join Artist Michael Orwick and go behind the scenes as he creates 3 large scale painting for his home town library.

Three 48x72 inch landscape paintings on canvas.

Short bio and history of the thoughts behind the creation of the images that grace the intrance to the new Lebanon Oregon Library.


Lebanon Library Art Project


Proposal ideas and size____________________________________________________

- 3 paintings, with 1.5 foot of wall space surrounding each one, for the large panel in the entry of the library

Expectations____________________________________________________________

I want to create paintings that reflect the beauty and strong ties I feel to the area, where I and seven generations of family before me grew up.

“Oh, beauty, ever ancient and ever new.” (Saint Augustine)

While I have been contemplating this amazing project and opportunity, I have been thinking both about how far I have come artistically, and about how much has truly changed in the town “that friendliness built.”

I have spent a time reflecting on change and growth, and despite all that obvious transformation, it is in fact what has remained constant that I continue to gravitate toward most: the sunsets my Great Grandfather Fred appreciated as he sat on the back porch after a grueling day on the farm (that is now the Lowe’s property); the refreshing cool my Grandmother Rusty, as a little girl, enjoyed as she splashed in the river; and the trails my Mother Laurie tromped through as she gathered up bouquets of purple Foxglove and the yellow blossoms of the Oregon grape. Change is important and constant, but it is what stays the same, those things that were beautiful then… and still retain the same appeal and potential to excite us today, which delights most.

What I propose is a series of paintings that are a reflection on atmosphere and light: the early morning moisture in the air, the thin veil of clouds resting atop Peterson’s Butte, the dust kicked up during hay season that turns the setting sun ablaze in warm hues and glowing contrasts…

The artwork would reflect the feeling I had as a child, blissfully floating down the Santiam River by inner tube, or fishing off its banks, with the warm summer light reflecting off the subtle rapids and the water-worn stones just beneath its surface.

I want my paintings to capture the magic and wander I felt as I discovered the forested trails in the hills surrounding town, and as I breathed the damp air with its very cognitive feeling of being enveloped in lush green life, and the sweet musk of decomposition as old stumps give rise to saplings and innumerable ferns. I want to capture the filtered dappled light making its way to the path just before leading me in, bidding me to explore the next bend just over the moss covered log.

The Library Art Project paintings have the potential to be the best I have ever created. I plan for them to read like four chapters that tell the story of the town that shaped me and ignited my lifelong appreciation for both natural and agricultural beauty, for winding water ways, softly rolling fields, and gray blue hills fading into the distance, which frames it all.

“We look at the picture. We walk in the picture. We ramble through the picture. We live in the picture. All are desirable, but the last two are held in the greatest respect.” (Kuo His)


Artwork, style, emotional impact____________________________________________

I have always felt that a painting’s job was to feel like a painting, to do the things that only paintings can... Paintings work best when not strictly adhering to the scene at hand, but when they capture the essence of the place and subject.

My tools are the canvas and oil paint, and using these two simple materials I strive to create the illusion of a third dimension. It has always been my goal to help the illusionary dimension feel real and beckon people to travel into it, to draw them as a place that is welcoming, that has certain nostalgia-like sense of a place they know well but are now seeing anew.

“Response [of viewers] is triggered by the design, drawing, form, color, etc. presented by the artist, but also draws on their own experiences and imagination.” (Ken Campbell)

My style has developed as a unique hybrid of elements from the artists and paintings I love. When people talk about my art they use word like “impressionistic” or “painterly,” which comes from my years studying the French impressionists and my deep fondness for the early California Impressionist painters. I love artwork that feels spontaneous yet controlled, like a thoughtful acknowledgement to what is being seen and felt.

People also use words like “relaxing,” “nostalgic,” and “timeless” to describe my pieces. This may indeed reflect my focus to overcome a deep seated fear of having my art feel dated or trendy. Years ago I began to ask myself what was the art that drew me in, which styles did I connect with most, and I noticed it wasn’t about an era or a movement... The art I like is about light and shadow, about atmosphere, and about conveying the special feeling of being in a certain place at a given time of day.

My art has been described as “story-like” or “illustrative,” and that one is easy to answer, I studied illustration and many of my favorite artists are the classic illustrators - artists such as Maxfield Parish and N.C. Wyeth, painters who created stunning images that get people excited about the story’s potential.


Reference photos_________________________________________________________

I have been fortunate to meet the local photographer Nick Boren. He has photographed the Lebanon area extensively for many years, and upon learning about my opportunity, has opened up his vast collection for me to work with. I have included 7 of his photographs and 5 of my own for you to get a better idea of subject matter images we could choose from. (I have numbered the backs in priority order to indicate which ones I prefer, but I would absolutely be happy to work with any of them as references.)


Conclusion______________________________________________________________

My paintings for the Lebanon Library project are going to be my thoughtful reaction to what I have been so lucky to have experienced first hand, while growing up surrounded by all of Lebanon’s potential and beauty.


“The vision of the artist is the vision to see and the ability to tell the world something that he or she unconsciously thinks about nature.” (Hawthorne)


Michael Orwick
www.michaelorwick.com

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New painting

Jenny Lake Canoes Grand Tetons National Park 16x20 oils on Raymar Plein Air Panel www.michaelorwick.com A painting for...me