Barnstable Harbor Painting Class

I brought my class to Barnstable Harbor on the North side of the Cape to paint on location.

The wind was coming in off the water on one of the last days of the summer of 2008. The sun was out and the students were game. I had everyone do two quick studies in the three hours there. Having them concentrate on getting in the flow of working outside and not worrying about making paintings today but just doing studies.

I told them today we are going to do little Hawthorne studies. “Do you know what that is?”

“No,” they said. Charles Hawthorne talked of putting one note of color against the next note of color. Getting the colors right and the painting will take care of itself. So simple, so true.

The stripers were jumping out of the harbor after the bait fish. We watched them just below the waters surface.