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THE PLEIN AIR CONNECTION April 19th to 21st, 2013


"Cloudy Seas, Reid State Park" an oil 8 x 10 in. by Michael E. Vermette

  In Beautiful Historic downtown Bath I discovered a new cooperative gallery on Centre Street that is located in a perfect place for viewing and buying quality art; The Centre St. Arts Gallery. I displayed a good representation of my watercolors and oils there as I met a lot of new and old familiar faces at the wine and ordure reception. After about an hour, we moved into a studio room set aside for my presentation that evening. I decided that I would not only speak about Monhegan's art history as advertised, but the four teaching principles I believed Robert Henri taught his students when painting en Plein Air on Monhegan Island. Setting the historical stage of the years Robert Henri came to Monhegan Island in 1903 and then comparing his influence to impressionist like his good friend Edward Willis Redfield, who encouraged him to go to Monhegan Island in the first place, I began the presentation. It covered the four motivational principles that I believe Henri used in what He refers to himself as, "The Race." These keys included: 1. Seeing The End in Sight before you paint, 2. Guarding Your Joy while Painting, 3. Painting with Both Hands on The Present and 4. Finishing well by painting what you came there to capture. I ended the presentation with a question I posed to the audience who were made up of artists and art lovers. A question I think Robert Henri would have asked his students himself. I posed,"What is more important, artistic talent or productivity?" Then I asked them to think about it and answer by the end of the workshop that would follow this presentation. 

The next day on Saturday we met at The Centre Street Gallery, LLC with complimentary muffins, coffee, tea and juice. There was rain that morning in the forecast and so we decided to stay dry and began the workshop in the studio at the gallery.  I covered methods on how to paint rapidly and the value of the interesting treatment of spontaneous brush and palette knife marks. That it is a quality always admired in plein air painting. The artists present painted quick sketches that took as little as 15 minutes and only as long as an hour using photographs or painting directly from a laptop as I did. I used this opportunity to talk about how to use photographs and what to watch out for in terms of color and distortion. Also what to do to correct the photo in your composition so that it is more like what we actually see on location. I also demonstrated establishing a Center  of Interest by introducing a lesson that trains the painter to start with it in each composition first rather tan putting it off until last. By the time we finished with these lessons it was lunch time and we had all agreed, Like John Singer Sargent, "Painting from nature is the best Teacher." Besides, the weather was already beginning to clear and the sun would come out eventually.  We ate together in  the studio as we critiqued and marveled the quality of our work that took so very little time to carry out. We had great conversation as we got to know each other more. The group discovered that I grew up in Wiscasset and Brunswick and my father worked at Bath Iron Works as a pipe-fitter and welder.
  After lunch the weather cleared and we traveled to Reid State Park, another haunt in my early teen years of High school. I had forgotten just how beautiful this place was and it was good to be back once again. It was that beautiful in-between time of changing weather systems of gray sky with moments of sun breaking through that made the light so special that day. The Seas were up with cross-winds blowing the foam from the waves in the opposite direction as they were crashing ashore.  We hunkered down on the west side of Griffin Head and we were able to escape the direct wind almost completely. This painting session was 2-hours long and I was very pleased that each artist had completed at least 3 paintings on the first day of the workshop.


"Griffin Head, Reid State Park" an oil 8 x 10 in. by Michael E. Vermette

   On Sunday morning we met at The Centre St. Gallery, LLC once again at 9 am with muffins, coffee, tea and juice.  As I began my introduction I could hear the faint sound of church bells ringing. Since there were so many watercolor painters present I decided to review using visual aids I brought, Hue, value, intensity and warm and cool principles.  I knew that would be a good starting place for the class before painting on location. I did invite The Plein Air Connect Group to join us at Reid State Park today and to paint with us, and Eric Glass my colleague, took us up on the invitation as a guest artist. We each made a morning painting that took about 2-hours, painting at the base of Griffin Head. It was sunny and the wind was still blowing hard so we opted to paint there. We ate lunch together and had our critique at the picnic tables with views of the sand bars as we watched the tide go out.  Even though the afternoon session was the "Painter's Choice" session (meaning that the class could paint anywhere they wanted to on the beach for their last session with me) we all painted the sand bars at low tide which became a formative challenge.  The sand color must have changed at least 4 times in the time we were there as we painted bright blue sea water sandwiched between these contrasting sand bar shapes of value and color. Eric Glass commented on how if felt almost tropical in color because it was one of those eye-achingly bright days.


"The Sand Bars at Low Tide, Reid State Park" an 8 x 10 in oil on panel by michael E. Vermette

       All in all it was a terrific workshop filled with risk and reward. The painters were real troopers. They were a great group of artists who were motivated  with enthusiasm with each painting challenge that I presented and who got a great start on their painting collection for the summer months to come. Perhaps the most memorable thing that happened was that I lost most of my voice after the presentation and had to teach the workshop with a such a horse voice it was as if I were the Godfather giving the artists an offer that they couldn't refuse. But with all joking aside, I have to say that I was fortunate to have such an understanding class that worked hard and proved for themselves just how great painting can be when they put aside their fears and simply begin. More importantly, and through their own work ethic, they answered for themselves the question that I posed at the beginning of the workshop at my presentation on "The Race." What is more important, artistic talent or productivity? For us all this weekend it was productivity with amazing results. For you see, excellence always follows productivity not the other way around. Great job everyone! I hope to be asked to come back and do it again sometime soon. In the mean time for those who couldn't make it this time, if you're in that area, why not stop by The Centre St. Gallery, LLC in downtown Bath, Maine? And while you're at it, treat yourself to a visit of the spectacular Reid State Park beach, lagoon and sand bars. I promise you it will be a place with jewel-like color. You can capture amazing things there in only two hours!


Artists at their final group critique at the plein air worskop on location at Reid State Park with Michael E. Vermette. The photograph was taken by Brunswick painter Eric Glass. 

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