Tag: en plein air

 How many times have I stumbled across an artist on a dock or in a garden perched before her easel, paint brush poised in hand, and felt a wave of envy? The artist is bathing in natural light and fresh air, transforming them into images on her canvas. Painting en plein air. It even sounds  romantic and exotic. I’ve tried painting and learned that indoors or in the wild, I have no talent.            But I can write, which some say is an art form, while others debate it’s a craft. There are those who say it’s both. I just know I’m driven to write and wondered what would happen if I took my act outdoors. Why not write en plein?My first attempts were during vacations. I remember sitting in a lemon grove in Sorrento, the sun warming my back and shoulders, smelling citrus, but no sense that other people were present while I wrote in my notebook. I breathed in the salt tinged fog on a dock in Maine early one morning writing with cold cramped fingers. I’ve always taken my journal with me to the beach, no matter which beach I was headed to.            When I began spending my […]