I am just back from participating in Cranford New Jersey’s “Paint The Town 2011” Plein Air Event and I won’t drag out the suspense until the end…I was awarded the competition 3rd prize! More on that later.
The Cranford event this year boasted a very strong roster of accomplished award winning artists from all over the East Coast and as far away as MN. We arrived on Tuesday afternoon, checked in at the event HQ, got our canvases stamped and then checked in with our host families.
Wednesday was the first day of painting and it was a hot one! It was the first of two “Extended Region” days which meant that we did not have to paint in the Cranford area. The organizers arranged for a bus to take us in to New York City. The bus dropped us at 77th Street and Central Park West. Almost all of the artists gravitated toward Central Park. Below is my painting of Bethesda Fountain which is just about in the middle of the park off of 72nd street.
Thursday was “Extended Region” day 2 which allowed us to paint at numerous locations on the Jersey Shore. It was even hotter on Thursday than it was on Wednesday and I arrived on the Asbury Park boardwalk at 7 AM in the hopes of finding some shade and some cool breezes off of the ocean. That part of my plan worked well. What I did not anticipate was the presence of many hungry horse flies that had a particularly strong appetite…for me! I managed to stick it out for two and a half hours painting the view looking north along the boardwalk. I titled it “Greetings from Asbury Park” after the Bruce Springsteen album. This is the painting which won 3rd prize.
After finishing up at Asbury Park I headed north a bit to Belford which has a lovely harbor full of working fishing boats. This is a 12 X 16 that I did as quickly as I could because the heat was becoming too much to bear!
Saturday was the “Quick Draw” where we were given 2 ½ hours to complete a painting in a small radius in downtown Cranford. Those of you who know me well know that 2 ½ hours is a long time for me to complete a painting on site. We had to deal with the first rainy day of the week but I managed to get a nice result painting the spire of the Presbyterian Church against the gray sky. The painting sold before I could get a photo of it but a local man shot it for me and will email it to me. I’ll include it in a later post.
All of the above paintings are available for sale from my website www.paulbachem.com.
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