Finding the Colour in a Scene and a Looser Style

Some of my art students are struggling with (at least) two things: Finding the colours in a scene where they aren't all that apparent, and loosening up their painting style. For some reason, it's not all that easy to loosen up; I said to one person, you'd think we'd been asked to bungee jump when all we're doing is just pushing paint around on a canvas. Her friend retorted, it's more like jumping without the bungee. Yet we continue to aspire to a looser rendering, not trusting the result.

The rock and pine scene, above, faced us across the water as we set up our easels at a boat launch in Haliburton, Ontario on the first drizzly morning of A Brush With the Highlands, an annual weekend plein air festival.  

Mostly done when I took the shot, Keith's red underpainting shimmers through his shapes, giving an otherwise grey-green scene a spark of vitality and warmth, though you can still appreciate the cool, overcast elements.

What to do? I could see that the rocks had some blue in them, so I laid down some quick blue strokes. I made the blue more intense, keeping the value correct. Working loose and fast I intensified the surrounding colours to keep in harmony with the new, more vibrant blue rocks. 

To get past tightness and fussiness I find the faster I work, the better the result. 

However, there are times when the best plan is to walk away rather than to linger, "finishing" and "fixing". Better to say, "My work here is done" and heed the siren call of the hot chocolate at the cafe down the road.