Original Plein Air Oil on Oak Board, Spring View from Blue Hill Mountain, Maine

  

"View From Blue Hill Mountain, Blue Hill, Maine". Vermette painted this plein air oil study at the summit of Blue Hill Mountain in Blue Hill, Maine. This land was donated by Ruth Hayes in 1977 and the generous gifts of the Frederick, Woodward, Becton, Clements families and is presently managed by the Blue Hill Heritage Trust.

With over 500 acres of protected land, there are over 4.5 miles of trails with the summit as its crowning jewel. In this painting you can view the greater Blue Hill Peninsula and the Hills of Camden in the far distance. From the massive pinkish granite face of the summit you can see contrasting lines of reindeer moss in their cracks, mushrooms and blueberry bushes. The spruce and fir trees create a defining line of lush green beauty as the viewer's eye is lead over the cliff, across the peninsula and then out-to-sea along the western Maine coast of Penobscot bay.

This painting is the result of a youtube video that Michael made as he demonstrated on the mountain; a live video located at: ME Art Spirit Studio Videos. This painted sketch was painted in a two-hour time frame so that the light depicted wouldn't change very much as the painting was created. Michael says, When you reach the summit you are fortunate to sit on a board that rests between two granite stones as a make shift bench.

There you witness the expanse of land before you as the landscape Springs to life with lush green tones from the gray wintery forms. This is a real painting experience of painting rock, tree line and the distant landscape that converge to the coast in perfect preserved recession into space. This is an oil painted study made on location on May 6th, 2020 as a part of Michael's Blue Hill Peninsula portfolio. Plein air painted in Michael's impasto style of thick strokes of paint on a solid alabaster stone-coated birch and cradled wood panel, he utilizes the thick impasto style of the Italian masters with Modern expressive marks of description.

These masters totally left out the use of turpentine and other solvents because it dulled their colors and eventually caused them to crack. They discovered that by Mixing black oil wax medium to their oil paint it not only improved the viscosity of the paint, but it increased its richness and offered a velvety semi-transparent sheen in appearance that would never crack. Michael makes this medium himself and uses it in his modern impasto paintings just as the Italian master's did back then. It is extremely permanent and archival. He mixes it with his painting pigments to the consistency of peanut better and it supports the integrity of every one of his painterly marks. As with other great impasto painters from Titian to Van Goah, Michael uses a descriptive stroke that describes the crevices, lines of power, motion, and shape in describing the summit of Blue Hill Mountain and beyond. He paints in an impasto (thick) style using assorted palette knives and an Italian Black Oil Wax medium that he makes himself and that sets him apart from other artists. He adds this medium to the oil paint to not only increase the oil paint's viscosity but to actually preserve the character and luster of every stroke of the artist. It also improves the color to a brighter velvety semi-transparent glow. This painting is also painted on a highly prized Gypsum Gessoed (Alabaster Stone coated gesso formula) over a solid kiln dried birch panel, which he prepares himself.

This painting comes unframed but will set into any standard plein air or floater frame like a jewel. This painting will give you years of visual enjoyment. They show a love of color and light with emphasis on the expressive painterly mark and form, which evoke a recognizable feeling, a nostalgic memory, or even emotional qualities such as the smell of salt and balsam in the morning ocean air. Vermette double majored in Painting and Printmaking at the Maine College of Art, receiving his B. A Painting degree in 1980.

He received his Certification in K-12 Art Education in 1986 through the University of Maine at Orono. A full-time artist and part-time art educator, Michael has been painting in oil, watercolor, and pastel for over fifty years and has won numerous awards for his work, including the Marilyn Sabin, Lauran Coleman and the Beverly Awards at the 12th, 13th and 14th Biennial North American Open Shows of the New England Watercolor Society where he has been awarded signature membership. He won Best of Show in the Kennebunk River Club Art Exhibit and Sale for his watercolor, "Sea Dog". Michael leads several oil and watercolor plein air painting workshops in Maine and New Hampshire throughout the year.

He is a Monhegan Artists' Residency Fellow and the 2011 Baxter State Park Artist-in-Residence in Maine. He was also an Artist-in-Residence at Acadia National Park twice in 1999 and 2006. His watercolors, oils, and pastels are in private collections throughout the country and internationally. In Maine, his works have been shown at various galleries and is currently represented by the Frame and Art Gallery in Yarmouth, The Lupine Gallery on Monhegan Island, and the Gleason Fine Art Gallery in Boothbay Harbor, all located in Maine. The item "Original Plein Air Oil on Oak Board, Spring View from Blue Hill Mountain, Maine" is in sale since Wednesday, May 20, 2020.

This item is in the category "Art\Paintings". The seller is "michaeleartspirit2" and is located in Old Town, Maine. This item can be shipped worldwide.

• Medium: Impasto Oil
• Subject: Landscape
• Style: Modern Impasto
• Region of Origin: US
• Listed By: Artist
• Painting Surface: Solid birch Cradled Wood gessoed Panel
• Features: cradled birch wood substrate
• Color: Impasto handmade Multi-Colored Oil
• Year: 2020
• Width (Inches): 10 inches
• Date of Creation: 2000-Now
• Height (Inches): 8 inches
• Originality: Original
• Artist: Michael E. Vermette
• Quantity Type: Single-Piece Work
• Size: Small (up to 12in.