Santa Clara mission church sketch - Mission Santa Clara de Asis (Updated)

Santa Clara Mission Church in December Storm
Catherine K. Moore 2014

I went out in the very rainy and windy storm last Thursday night, soaking my shoes and clutching an umbrella to save my camera, to get a photo of the Santa Clara mission church reflecting in all of the rain water pouring down.  I wanted to also frame in both the Christmas tree and the cross against the warm colors of the uplit church with the wind bending the palm trees.  Having both a Christmas and Easter reference in a painting was something I did in "Eggs and Ornament" which is in this blog.

I did not know very much about the church so in between the several iterations of making this oil painting sketch I read up on it.  There is an "A" under the center top eaves which seems to be for the branding symbol the mission used to use on their cattle.  This is the sixth Santa Clara mission church to be built, this one is modeled after the 1825 version with toned down interior paint colors.  The left tower has bells in it, and from referencing old photographs, the Christmas tree in front sometimes has multi-colored lights on it.  I must admit this painting was a real struggle; it is a very direct view of the church with lots of contrast and there is rainfall pouring down to try and capture in a relatively tiny painting.  The rain is slightly indicated in the sky through brush strokes.  Additionally, the paint never dried due to high humidity this week and it was worked entirely wet in wet, limiting dry brush technique and requiring blending instead. 

After painting the Stowe church in snow from the east coast, this is quite an interesting contrast with a mission church, in rain with green grass in December from the west coast.  Enjoy!

Update Note:  I did work to redo the tree lights because they were looking too much like snow on the branches to me, and alter the sky to reflect the gray-purple which my camera still shows more saturated than the painting for some reason and I could not get Photoshop to correct it.  I especially like the metaphor of the church as being solid and warm during a storm, and the "storm" being life's trials and tribulations.

Here is the altered painting as it is today (1/7/2015) but the sky is gray-er.  Enjoy!

- Kitty Moore Cupertino

Santa Clara Mission Church in storm
2015 Catherine K. Moore

Stowe in snow

Greetings! Here is the church in the village of Stowe, Vermont in an early snowfall at late dusk.  In this painting I am trying to recreate what happens with vision at low light levels when there is a bright light (on the church) and the background hills still have a slight glow on them at higher elevations.  Between the mountains the light level gets low quite early in the winter months.  Unlike the fall painting I did of the same scene, you can see several of the village shop buildings and the Memorial Building (on the right) when the trees are bare.   Enjoy!

Stowe in Winter Twilight
2014 Catherine K. Moore