Another Field Study

Since returning home I've been looking over the paintings, photos and sketches I did in New Harmony. While there, I only did a few oil sketches. Most of my time was spent with pastels. This little oil sketch was also one of my paintings stamped for field to finish. Looking solely at this sketch it seems busy but when I got to looking at it and the photo it is quite simplified. The farm this scene was located at was just loaded with potential paintings and I will returning there next year as well. This sketch probably will not be used for the competition but it will be re-examined and turned into something else. Yesterday I started doing small pastel studies of the few sketches I got done on site. So far I'm really excited with what has been happening with them. Soon I will begin the largest paintings I've done to date and these sketches are giving me a lot of confidence and ideas to run with.

Today I am posting a study done a little while back for a painting that will hopefully be ready by the time the state fair gets here.
During the planting season back home after a long stretch of wet weather it quickly became schorching hot. While in the tractor looking out, the heat made the trees at the edge of the field look as if they were dancing and when the dust got to stirring they started to look like mirages in a desert. I had to jump out and take a picture before the dust died down.(sadly I didn't ghost ride the tractor, I stopped it before getting out) Thankfully a few photos came out and this study came from that.

Thanks for looking.