I love the way that other languages make painting sound so exotic. Plein Air is the french word used to describe the process of packing up all your gear and parking yourself outside somewhere to paint. Traditionally, you bring along a small surface on which to capture the scene in front of you. Pochade is another french work for this. I think it means ‘pocket’ as in ‘pocket-size’. I am new to this. In fact, I’ll confess that I have stated many times that I would never do landscapes and could not understand why anyone would venture outside to paint. ‘Never say Never’ could have been the title! I mean, cameras are wonderful inventions and I did my share of clicking away while in the park. None of those pics, however, comes close to burning an image in your mind like standing in front of a scene and struggling to record it while light changes, wind blows your stuff around, and strangers approach to view and comment 🙂 Often painters work these up into bigger works, during the winter, inside where it’s nice and warm…..sounds like a great idea…

oil on panel, 8×10, plein air study

plein air, 8×10, oil on panel, Algonquin Park