I am a born and raised Missouri girl, and I don't have big mountains in my state. Some people refer to the Ozarks as mountains, but if that is the case, then they are really short!
Nonetheless, I wanted to practice some more mountain paintings in preparation for our trip this month out west. I am really looking forward to journaling out west in Washington and Montana.
We have a trip coming up this November, and I wanted to be practicing landscape paintings for journaling. Value studies are so helpful to me - seeing how the light plays across the landscape. Where are the darkest darks and lightest lights and what is in-between?
We had just set up our tent at the quiet edge of Carlyle Lake in Illinois when I noticed a LARGE cloud of insects not far from our site. My heart sank. What did we get ourselves into? I cautiously walked over to check it out fearing I would get attacked. Instead, I watched in utter amazement as the group of insects hovered and swayed, dancing in total unison. How they maintained that unison was beyond me. It looked like a well orchestrated performance.
Needless to say, I was elated to discover that they were nice neighbors that kept to themselves. I was so touched by their beautiful dance that I felt compelled to sketch one and write a poem about them.
