Coastal Wall Art: Two Plein Air Paintings from Laguna Beach

There are paintings I make in the studio from a reference photo, and there are paintings I make outside while trying to keep my hat from blowing into the ocean. Laguna Bluff and Rocks at Woods Cove are both from the second category.

Both painted on location in Laguna Beach. Both 12×16, oil on panel. Both made in that compressed window of time you get with plein air work on the coast, before the light shifts and the composition you started no longer matches what's in front of you.

What the Bluffs Actually Look Like

Laguna's coastline is almost aggressively beautiful in the sense that jagged rocks jut out every which way to create landforms not commonly found in the US. The sandstone bluffs have this quality in afternoon light — they go warm, almost amber, against the deep cobalt of the Pacific. Stand at the edge of one for ten minutes and you understand why people have been painting this stretch of coast for a hundred years.

For Laguna Bluff, the challenge was the contrast. Warm, textured rock face against cold, and constantly moving dark water. The scrubby native vegetation at the top. The sky, which in Southern California in the afternoon is doing its own thing entirely. You have to make a call about what matters most in the composition and then commit, because there's no time to revisit with the ever-changing light.

Plein air forces you to pull out all of the tools in your kit. Every decision is a simplification. By the time I was packing up, the light had moved enough that the version I'd started no longer matched what was in front of me. That's usually a sign you made the right calls early.

Woods Cove Is a Different Kind of Problem

Woods Cove is a small pocket beach just south of downtown Laguna, and the rock outcroppings there have a particular kind of chaos to them. Waves come in from multiple directions at once, hit the rocks from different angles, and collapse into each other. Standing at the edge of it while trying to paint something coherent is a little bit absurd.

The thing you have to give up with a subject like that is the idea of painting every wave. You pick the version of the scene that works compositionally, you commit to it, and you let the brushwork carry the energy of what's actually happening. Dark rock in the foreground, white water breaking against it, the deeper blue-green of the open ocean behind. The paint goes on thin at first to establish the composition and dark values, then fast and thick because the subject demands it.

The finished painting reads chaotic in a way that's controlled. Which is the goal.

What Painting Outside Actually Teaches You

Plein air is humbling in a specific way. The conditions are against you, and there is no time to procrastinate — shifting light, wind, strangers stopping to tell you they've always wanted to paint. The paintings I've made on location aren't better because I've mastered some technique. They're better because I had no choice but to simplify and work quickly. When you have an hour and the tide is rising, you stop caring about perfection and start caring about capturing something true.

Both of these ended up as studies I'm genuinely proud of. 

The Paintings

Both Laguna Bluff and Rocks at Woods Cove are available originals — oil on panel, painted on location. They've found their way into a licensed collection, which is a good sign for what they are. If you want to own either one, the originals are available in the studio: Laguna Bluff and Rocks at Woods Cove. You can also browse the full collection of available original works.