way to get some practice—getting something down fast, nailing
a lighting effect—but the danger is falling into predictable pat-
terns, what I call ‘recipes.’ You feel you must have something to
hang on the wall. You think, ‘Man, this has got to work. The baby
needs some shoes!’ So, you go with what worked last time. Now
you’re not painting, you’re just repeating. You’re cooking the same
bowl of chili each time. At some point, you think, ‘I’m tired of this
chili. I want some pasta!’ ”
Instead of the race, Whitcomb would rather slow down, look
attentively and let the questions flow. When he beholds a land-
scape, he can’t help but ask: “What are the chords that it strikes
within me?” Then, “How do I make a statement about that?”
Painting outdoors is, for him, about going to the source. “I go
outside, and the idea blossoms,” he says.
Sometimes, the idea can take years to gestate. This was the
case with Ascension. The study was executed at Donner Pass, in
California’s Sierra Nevada Mountains. “The study sat for several
years before I even looked at it again,” he recalls. When he finally
did, he started exploring the idea with thumbnail sketches. “I was
really interested in the structure of those rock masses,” he says.
“I wanted to explore where it might go.”
LEFT
Evening Overlook
(15x26)
BELOW
Rocks Surf (12x32)“I’m not going to duplicate what’s out there.
The fewer shapes, the greater the power.”
— SKIP WHITCOMB
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