Plein air artist Donna Lyons’ drawings and paintings from her Colorado Plateau travels are on view at the Columbine Library located at 7706 West Bowles Avenue, Littleton. This solo exhibition runs from November 1-30.
Plein air artists who work in watercolor are in the minority in outdoor painting groups. Colorado painter Lyons has many years of experience in executing washes with a big brush under the challenges painting on location can present – inclement weather, pesky insects and grouchy wildlife.
Photo by Julia Grundmeier
“I once had to climb a tree to avoid a conflict with three moose during the autumn rut,” Lyons says. “Bees are attracted to the honey as a binder in my pigments. Many times the wind has carried off my paper, easel, tripod and my hat putting them all in the river!” While a nuisance, it’s all part of the joy she feels when out of doors with her palette and brushes.
“The act of painting for me”, Lyons states, “is more than giving life to interesting forms and their arrangements, or the quality of light as it falls on these shapes. Each of my paintings tells a little story of an hour or two in the life of a river, tree, mountain, or a meadow. My work records moments in my day. I am painting my personal relationship to the site. I am painting my life. It is a constant goal for me to reveal in pigment the secrets of the two landscapes we all live in – our own backyard and the eternal and divine – and somehow, capture the ‘wonderment’.”
Lyons teaches watercolor classes through Rocky Mountain Conservancy Field Institute in Rocky Mountain National Park. Her book, “My Kawuneeche: An Artist’s Journal in Rocky Mountain National Park was released in 2015.