I need to add something very important to my Day 6 report that meant a lot to me.
It was Tuesday morning, 8 a.m., bright and early on our first day back in Meadville and Tom and I had a special appointment with George Nowack. He was picking us up to accompany him to the studio of COOL 101.7 WMVL FM for his Tuesday morning radio show.
Yep, George has a segment on the local classic rock station to promote his work on the Rt. 6 Artisan Trail.
The host, Dave was really “cool” and made me feel quite at home on the show. He asked lots of questions about my career and I had an opportunity to tell the Linesville/Meadville/Corry areas about my role in our project of documenting PA Route 6 through paintings. Thanks Dave and George for the opportunity to tell my story!
Now, back to the road.
Tom and I headed to Corry early Wednesday morning. It was a beautiful day to paint, but oh so windy!!!!
Let me share something about plein air painting and wind. Picture this, you have a box of 150 pastels in a wooden tray attached to your easel in a very precarious manner, then you add a board on which you’re painting and put it in a vertical position. On a windy day, the easel and board act like the sail on a sailboat which means everything wants to take flight!
This would be, in a word, unacceptable.
So on the way to Mead Park in Corry, we stopped and picked up a couple of very sturdy bungee cords. It was a great idea because tree limbs were snapping all over the place in that incredible wind!
While panting in the park I had the pleasure of meeting Mark Hulings, a fellow artist who moved to Corry 5 years ago. He is very involved in the community and made a special appointment for me to visit and tour Corry’s fantastic museum. It was amazing the history they have displayed. There were items dating back to 1000 B.C. on display. Looking at the foot-pumped dental drill made my teeth tingle. They also showed me their Climax Locomotive that used to run through town at the beginning of the last century. I was very impressed how the museum was laid out in various themes. Check it out the next time you are going through Corry.
The park is located adjacent to the museum and I was really looking forward to painting the lovely footbridge over the water. I was told that many newlyweds have come to this location to take photos, so my goal was to create a romantic, wistful painting.
While I was painting, Steve Sears from Corry’s newspaper, the Journal, stopped by to interview me and take photos of me at work. Of course with all the wind it was a really bad hair day! I was giving him a lot of information about the Rt. 6 project and told him he really needed to interview George. He looked at me and said he would speak to George but tomorrow’s article was my story. That was sweet.
Steve was a great guy and I had a wonderful time talking with him. He even posed for me so don‘t be surprised if he shows up in a painting!
About an hour later I had to stop painting this piece. The lighting was changing too fast and the wind decided to act up even more. Giving in to the elements and the light we put away my supplies and revisited many of the locations I saw last week in the rain in order to see them in the sunshine.
We left for Warren and checked out Leslie Runco’s grandparents home, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright home on Madison Ave. Leslie is from my BNI business group and she sent me a message on Facebook of her childhood memories here in Warren. It was fun trying to find the home and the former location of her grandfather’s auto parts store. Hopefully we took photos of the right corner in Warren. The house photo turned out great. I’m excited for her to see it.
Tomorrow I will paint 2 pieces at Crescent Park along the Allegheny River across from downtown Warren. I am really excited because the area is so picturesque.
I’ll let you know how it goes!
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