In anticipation of the upcoming Red Rock Arts Festival, in which I’m competing in the plein air competition, I decided to participate in my first plein air workshop.

The 2022 Red Rock Arts Festival (RRAF) is a four-day multimedia, participatory arts festival inviting creative connectedness and activating public spaces in vibrant Moab, Utah. Designed to feed the public imagination, incite playfulness, and build community, the weekend will be stacked with free workshops and events for all ages.

www.redrockartsfestival.com

The workshop is hosted by the talented Dustin Hardgrove, a member of Gallery Moab. Two workshops are being offered free of charge in the spirit of the event. I was pretty excited about this since I missed out on a workshop earlier this year.

I was initially a little nervous since I rarely paint with other artists and have almost zero experience plein air painting. It turns out it went really well though and I really enjoyed myself. I felt like I mostly knew what I was doing from the years of daily painting challenges done from life. Turns out, painting from a still life is really good practice for plein air. It also really came in handy that I’m used to painting all prima and quickly.

Dustin gave me some really good critiques, which I tried my best to implement. I don’t know that I successfully understood and achieved all of the suggestions. I think continuing to paint with others will definitely help me get back into the groove of receiving and implementing feedback.

I’m looking forward to the upcoming plein air competition. It’ll be interesting to see what the other artists paint. I don’t expect to win anything, but it’ll be fun to participate anyway. Check back here next week to see what I ended up painting.