Landscape Painting

Before we left for Spring Break I had asked my Art Explorers after school class for some input on what our next project should be. Together they came up with an extensive list with some real possibilities shinning through. One of them was “Scottish landscape”. Now I haven’t quite gone the way of Scotland, but I love the simplicity that “landscape” offers us as we learn from home.

WHAT IS A LANDSCAPE?
A landscape is an artwork that features the countryside or land as its point of emphasis (main idea).

So, we’re going to use some things we have on hand to paint our own landscape. Hopefully you’ve been able to get outside over the past several weeks because the weather has been gorgeous.

MATERIALS:
+ clean scrap cardboard
+ blue, green, white, and black paints; varying shades
+ brush and water
* optional pencil

I started with my sky for this painting because it’s in the background and I want my land to layer in front of it. I used a scrap piece of paper to create a paint palette- here I can mix paints as needed. I brushed on my acrylic paints across half of my cardboard. Some areas are lighter and some are darker because when you look up and out at the sky, it’s not just one shade of blue.

I didn’t let this dry for very long before starting on my rolling green hills.

On the same palette I added some green paints. Those blues can still be used to create some blue-greens, which will come in handy in just a moment! Now, you may want to use that pencil and draw some gently curved lines for your rolling hills. I felt confident enough that I did not have to do that step, so I skipped the pencil.

Before painting, I thought about what it looks like to look out over a large swath of land. What I notice is that land forms and features that are FAR away look smaller and darker than the ones right in front of us. This is called atmospheric perspective. It’s your eyes and brain not quite working together, making light in the distance appear darker and objects that you KNOW are large, seem very small. So for my first hill that’s making up the background of my land, I mixed some darker greens and blues together.

For my MIDDLEGROUND, that is the middle of my land, it’s not the darkest but it isn’t the lightest yet either. I mixed some of my medium greens and blues and also just used the medium green to create two layers of hills. Notice I make each band of color touch- just as it would in real life.

To finish, I then created my FOREGROUND, the front of my land/painting. Here I used my lightest blues and greens to create the pieces of land that are closest to me. My foreground is actually made up of three seperate hills/colors.

Next I wanted to give my hills some good texture. Grass isn’t flat and singular in color. So I used some of the mixed colors on my palette to dab my brush in each section to create the appearance of grasses waving in the wind. Notice that I didn’t cover up my first colors, but lightly layered the new colors on top! If you end up using too much paint in an area, let it dry and then try again. No biggie!

Once your hills are complete it’s time to focus on the sky once more. I gently tapped my brush into the white paint, making sure there wasn’t a lot on my brush. You can use your palette to wipe off excess paint if you need. Holding my brush upright, I gently dabbed the white paint into fluffy clouds across my sky. On top of the white clouds I added a very tiny amount of blue and then an even tinier amount of black (that almost looks grey) to create some realistic shadows on the bottom of my clouds. Just like the sky and the land, when we look at clouds we see more than just white.

My final step was to use that same tiny amount of black paint to create some rocks scattered among my hills. Use the same dabbing technique that you used to make the grass texture. This may take you less than an hour but it’s ok if it takes you more! I really love the bright colors and the texture that I created.

Are there other objects from nature that you’d like to add? Happy making!