We spent a long weekend in Santa Barbara, CA, and drove up into the gorgeous Santa Ynez valley one day. This painting started as a sketch that day.
The Santa Ynez valley immediately made me think of Corot’s groundbreaking Italian plein air landscapes.
The Santa Ynez valley up above and inland from Santa Barbara, California is really too pretty to describe. I hope the painting says enough.
While there we also visited the Fess Parker winery- delicious!
A misty gray morning on the beach in Santa Barbara, California, with sailboats moored on the wide Pacific.
Oil on linen painting panel.
Evening light on Santa Barbara’s incredible mountains, seen from a side street off State Street.
I was amazed by the atmospheric light effects on these mountains.
I thought I’d never seen light like this anywhere else, and then we saw the same effect in a Monet painting of the Italian riviera in the Santa Barbara art museum.
8 x 10 inches
oil on linen on panel