Yesterday morning I visited Rockingham Historic Site in Kingston, NJ. This was George Washington’s final Revolutionary War headquarters.

This 9″ x 12″ oil painting is the result of my time visiting there with my plein air group.   I am working on finding the “softness” in buildings. I’m not so sure I enjoy painting buildings because they tend to be rather “stiff” in my work.  But I think I was able to capture a little more of the “essence” of the structure vs. focusing on the “rightness” of the structure.

One of the other challenges was dealing with the bright sunny view and finding a range of values to incorporate.  The dark, dark shadows  in the rear forest did helped create a primary contrast and “sense” of light.  I really like the physical painting as I continue to look at it.

I think I may paint this again much larger as an experiment.  It would be interesting to see it on a 24″x 36″ canvas.  This is on my radar for an upcoming project.  I’ve done a few larger works but never a landscape at that scale.   Might be fun!!!