#184 Appalachian Trail 9/2/19

For my birthday, Dave took me out to dinner.  But first he stopped at Howard's Art Supply.  Said I could pick out whatever I wanted!  Well, I needed canvases, but I just bought 30 of them!  So I ended up selecting some green "Bob Ross" brand oil paint, 3 new brushes and a "view finder".  While we were there, Dave spotted a sign that said they were looking for entries for their "14th Annual Art for the Animals Fundraiser".  $5 will buy a small canvas board, bring it back by 9/14 with something you've painted, Howard's will frame it and it will be part of their Silent Auction that runs Sept 28 through Oct 12.  I'm in!!  Today I painted my entry, a labor on Labor Day.  I had spent the previous 2 days attempting to stop in the middle of the road in order to photograph the Hiker Crossing signs.  They're on both sides of the road as you head down into Smithburg.  It seemed like every time I thought to do this, there would be cars behind me.  Finally this weekend, I lurked in a driveway until the coast was clear and I got my pictures. I asked Dave for a critique, and he said one side of the road needed to be shadier than the other.  I asked Joe for a critique, and he said the road appeared slanted and the tree trunk had too many stripes.  I asked myself for a critique, and I said the dappled sunlight on the road looked palette-knife-ish, while the rest of the painting did not. I shaded the left side tree line, I leveled out the top of the road drop-offs, I repainted the tree trunk and I blended the dappled sunlight into smithereens.  Hi, my name is Deanna and I'm an over-blender.  There's got to be a support group for people like me.  I couldn't fit the entire phrase "Appalachian Trail" on the signage.  I wanted it to be vaguely readable, so the lettering had to be big enough for that....the palachi part of Appalachian is kind of smushed together in order to get the word "trail" in before I ran out of sign.  Both Joe and Dave said they could definitely tell the picture was of stick-people hiking.  It has 11 days to dry enough for a quick varnish....hence a subject matter that didn't involve red.  On Sept 28 they have an "Opening Reception" - I may go, pretend it's my gallery show opening, get myself a short black dress and dangly earrings to wear, and sunglasses maybe, work on having a moody artist-persona....it will be fun!