Sea and Cloud (oil)

This oil painting is at the top of our stairs and is a favorite.  The 22" x 26" canvas was first given a coat of white acrylic.  The next day the background of cobalt turquoise blue was painted with a large brush over the entire canvas.  A day later, I began to use titanium white starting with the bottom third of the painting, which was to be reminiscent of waves.  There was something about this painting that made me feel very free, as if  there was no wrong way for it to develop.  And so I allowed the brush to move in wavelike motion across the canvas with some turquoise blue on the brush toward the top of the wave and in other areas.  I added lavender within the wave and in the top blue portion of the painting.  In West Cork, lavender appears often in the sea a sky.  The next level emerged from a desire to combine sea and sky and so the splashing of the wave (small dots)  in the bottom section of the painting is reduced -- but still there.  The upper layer was to be cloud and so a sense of movement across the canvas was guiding my hand in applying the white and blue that shaded the cloud and created a sense of layering.  

I've come to love oil painting, especially of this type, where what you put on the canvas is not right or wrong but rather a free flowing of emotion.  This painting almost painted itself.  Once I started the three layers, I didn't stop until they were done.  Each section is punctuated by light and dark turquoise, which accentuates the white, shapes the wave and cloud elements and adds to the sense of motion.  This kind of painting is joyful.  If I was shaking, it didn't matter.