Historical Collection I

St. James Catholic Church

18 x 13 3/4

This is my second attempt at captivating the mighty presence of St. James. This structure has cast shadows for well over 100 years and is some of our most prominent architecture in Clark County. I have worked this painting off and on over the last ten days and it has been a great challenge. One reason i took this on was to push myself into creating a piece, something that most people have seen and know well, and making it look believable; a task, not easily accomplished. I'm not entirely sure if i will continue to work on this piece, i think i will let it settle for a couple days and review it with fresh eyes to see if there are any details i would like to change. I am pretty happy with the lines and dimensionally i think it's pretty sound. One thing new for me was the implementation of the #6 Round. I had never used a round brush with oil paints before, and the foreground retaining wall face, which i struggled with, owes all its marbling and texture to the rolling and sliding ability of the great.... #6 Round. Charles Hawthorne said in his book, Hawthorne on Painting, "Swing a bigger brush; you don't know what fun you are missing." While i wholly believe this, i would like to add that the versatility and creativity of the round cannot be understated either and i now have a new best friend in #6.