I completely finished last night. This is a painting of a place called The Dreamland Hotel, which is in the Keweenaw Peninsula of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. The Inn was built in 1913, and was often a gathering place for loggers in the area. It is fairly close to our family cottage.
I am pretty happy with the result. I avoided getting bogged down in unnecessary detail, and the lighting worked out fairly well. There is a quiet to the place, and I think the perspective communicates it. I learned a lot with this one. It's 2' x 2', on 1/2" birch plywood.
I just found this old photo:
My family has been frequenting the restaurant for about 60 years, and I have every summer since I was born. Last summer when we were eating there, I realized that they had two paintings of the hotel on the wall there, but the most recent one was probably from the 60's, so I decided to paint it.
Here's the process in reverse:
I'm deciding what to paint next. I think I might paint a night scene. I want to practice with something dominated by light.
This is beautiful. I'm very impressed. Also, I appreciate seeing the process in reverse order. Thanks for that
Don't feel pretentious at all, just be honest: "It's only my third oil painting ever, it took me a x hours working on it, I enjoyed coming here as a kid and wanted to honour the place" etc. I think they'd definitely welcome it, plus it's an excuse to go to the restaurant!
Still completely dig the log. To me your newest feels much improved over your first landscape picture here. I think it sets an emotional tone very well comparatively. I would pay going starving artist rates for the both the newest and Log. Pretty much my definition of good in my book. Actually I'd prob pony up a few extra for Log.