Winter, pastel - Portraits of Animals

Winter is 12″ x 24″, and though the original is sold I offer a variety of prints on canvas or paper.

ABOUT THE ARTWORK

Winter, pastel, 12 x 24, 1998 © Bernadette E. Kazmarski

Winter is represented by the frozen hillsides of a farm drifted with snow and reflecting the colors of a winter sunset. The quiet, stillness and subtle color, the snow drifted up against the fencelines in the distance and caught on the clumps of flattened grasses and brush in the fields, the flat sky reflecting the glow of the sun now gone, are all visions that I associate with winter. Even when you don’t see the wind pushing and drifting the snow, you can see the effect in the drift as it is shaped and carved by an unseen hand, and other areas, scoured clean of all but a dusting and left to freeze.

This photograph was taken by a friend of mine who lives on this working dairy farm that I visited when I began painting en plein air. I found this frozen, still sunset absolutely beautiful, the quiet of the empty fields and big open sky, the sound of the wind, the sky gently fading to violet and the windrows and fences marking off the edges of the fields, like a quilt, each angle catching a different shade of fading light.

When I look at this painting, I hear my Windham Hill recordings of Winter Solstice I and II, if you’re familiar with those new age recordings from the 1980s.

Winter is one of a quartet of paintings, “The Four Seasons”, commissioned to fit a special handmade frame. Scroll down to read about the creation of “The Four Seasons”.

SHIPPING

Shipping within the US is included in all the prices listed. All shipping is via Priority Mail. Prints are shipped flat in a rigid envelope. Canvases are shipped in a box to fit with padding. Since this original is small it is also shipped in a box with extra padding.

GICLEE PRINTS

The giclees are printed on acid-free hot press art paper for a smooth matte finish using archival inks. Giclee is the highest quality print available because the technique uses a dozen or more ink ports to capture all the nuances of the original painting, including details of the texture, far more sensitive than any other printing medium. Sometimes my giclees look so much like my originals that even I have a difficult time telling them apart when they are in frames. The giclees have 2″ of white around the outside edges.

I don’t keep giclee prints in stock for most of my works. Usually I have giclees printed as they are ordered unless I have an exhibit where I’ll be selling a particular print so there is a wait of up to two weeks before receipt of your print to allow for time to print and ship.

DIGITAL PRINTS

Digital prints are made on acid-free matte-finish natural white 100# cover using archival digital inks. While digital prints are not the quality of a giclee in capturing every nuance and detail of color, texture and shading, I am still very pleased with the outcome and usually only I as the artist, could tell where detail and color were not as sharp as the original.

The 5″ x 7″ and 8″ x 10″ digital prints are centered on 8.5″ x 11″ digital cover while the 11″ x 14″ has 1″ around the edges because the digital paper is 12″ wide. All are countersigned by me.

CANVAS PRINTS

I usually have at least one of the smaller sizes of canvases on hand, but order larger ones as they are ordered here because customers often want a custom size. Smaller canvases are a 3/4″ in depth, Canvases 12 x 16 and larger are 1-1/2″ in depth. I set them up so the image runs from edge to edge, then the sides are black or white or sometimes I slip in a color that coordinates with the painting.

About “The Four Seasons”

“The Four Seasons” © Bernadette E. Kazmarksi

Years ago a patron of a gallery in Carnegie where I hung my artwork asked me to paint four images for a very special frame she had.

The frame had been designed and handmade in wood by her father-in-law, was long and narrow, and had four openings, each 12″ high by 24″ wide. Each opening had its own piece of glass, and between each opening was a 1/2″ slat of wood as a divider. The outside border of the frame was 2″ wide and flat with hand carved figures which I believe were leaves, like a vine. Overall it had a warm and rustic appearance.

The frame came apart in the center so that there were two panels in each half, and art and glass slid in and out through this opening. The area for the artwork was barely deep enough for a piece of drawing paper, so he must have intended it for photos when he designed it. The frame locked together in the back so that the two halves held together and hung on the wall without sagging.

She was interested in pastel drawings on paper, which were a good choice for this since even flat painting panels would not have fit.

As soon as she described the frame to me I thought of painting the four seasons, in part because of the four sections of the frame, and it’s also a theme I enjoy here in Western Pennsylvania. The customer would enjoy it too, because I’d been to her house and large picture windows were placed to enjoy the landscape from all angles, and the view of the countryside was something she always mentioned.

So I collected reference photos from my rambles for each of the seasons, thinking purely of landscapes. Skies are one of my favorite daily studies, no matter the season; I could watch skies forever, the clouds moving, the changing light. Choosing the right moment of sky to paint into a landscape is a very serious choice for me, as you’ll see in looking at all four paintings in this series.

But she loved white cats and had actually purchased my painting “A Warm Bath” featuring my Angora cat Sally in a bath in morning sun at my side window, and asked me to add a white cat in somewhere since she’d given that painting as a gift. I really considered the best way to include a cat in the first panel, “Spring”. The scenes of the landscapes were typical of landscape paintings, showing the middle and far distance, where a cat would be hard to spot. For the landscape itself I remembered the layout of her yard and acreage, and collected some of my favorite photos of spring blooming garden.

But I remembered one of her picture windows and a countertop that extended partway in front of it and decided what I’d do. I had taken several reference photos of Sally having a good bath in front of that window for “A Warm Bath” and chose a more upright posture where she appeared to be looking out the window. The cat looking out the window in the first painting would also lend the idea that you were looking out the window at all the landscapes.

In this painting of spring I chose a misty moment in early morning, it’s rained overnight, all is covered with raindrops and the mist is still rising, the clouds parting.

Spring

While “Spring” is based on the customer’s property, the other three are not only treasured landscapes but also have emotional ties to the cats in my life.

“Autumn” is a hay field with a rambling little stream and scrubby trees as autumn rain clouds roll in which I had photographed along one of the back roads I enjoyed. She had an old farm pond on her property and though her land was hilly I wanted to include a pond somehow.

“Autumn”, pastel, 12″ x 24″, 1997 © B.E. Kazmarski

“Winter”, pastel, 12″ x 24″, 1997 © B.E. Kazmarski

The one interesting part of this quartet is something I did not plan at all, but happened as I put the paintings together. If you let your eye run from one to the next you’ll notice that the horizon line is consistent from one to the next, and the time of day is actually progressive with “Spring” being very early morning, “Summer” about noon, “Autumn” mid afternoon, and “Winter” at sunset. When I saw this developing as I planned the paintings I found I could actually match up the horizon lines, but the times of day were part of the scenes I’d chosen. I had first considered actually having the seasons and times of day blend into one another, but decided the frame really wouldn’t accommodate that convincingly, instead letting the viewer’s eye fill in the connections.

Prints available of these paintings

Each is a nice painting individually, and together they make a wonderful display of canvas prints, whether at the smaller size or full size.

Other items with the same art or design To find all items on this site with the same art or design, use the search box for the name of the artwork and you'll find all that's available.

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All images used on this site are copyrighted to Bernadette E. Kazmarski unless otherwise noted and may not be used without my written permission. Please ask if you are interested in using one in a print or internet publication. If you are interested in purchasing a print of this image or a product including this image, check to see if I have it available already. If you don’t find it there, visit “purchasing” for availability and terms.