Luke thought the view was better from the middle of the street! Here he is "risking it all for art".
He had some close calls but Luke is a dedicated plein airist and it seems to have been worth 2 hours of facing down the muzzle of death. Neither the many cars that crept slowly by scraping their fenders against those buildings on the right, nor the passing burro trains did any lasting damage at all. He ended up with a great painting! When we left he was priming up another panel - this time a little closer to the wall, enjoying a vastly greater margin of safety. What surprised me was that only one or two dudes seemed to be the least bit upset with the situation. Sure, the ricos may have lost a little magnesium here and there. It was admittedly hard on a lot of tires!!! - I didn't much like that chafing/squeely rubber sound ............ , a lot of "commute time" was lost.
Maybe I'm just overly sensitive and shy. I don't even like being in the "limelight" much. Luke is a Waldorf school graduate and those people really know how to release the right side of a persons brain. Though only centimeters were between him and a trip to the morgue, he paid absolutely zip attention to all that passing metal.
A DISCLAIMER
Do not even think about trying this. To survive in the middle of the calles of San Miguel for more than a few moments requires a superhuman degree of luck and optimism - don't say I didn't warn you.
Below is the one I did from safely against that orange wall on the left.
"Sunny Morning - Nov. 2013"
9 x 12 in. oil on panel
SOLD
Luke was beside and behind me a couple of meters. The rest of Donna's students were at the top of the street - a good hike up the hill. One of them had one of 3 legs of her easel fall off when she tried to set it up for the first time. I lent her mine while I went dashing around town for a replacement - which I found but then it was missing a critical adjustment knob. These were brand new "in the box" easels so I was more than a bit annoyed ............... however ................. I took it home and fired a screw into the hole where the missing screw should have been, ran back down the hill and got a nice, very late start. So, needless to say, you are seeing a goodly amount of studio work in the one above. I like the result though - the color was all pegged pretty much in the calle, in the first hour. Maybe I'll do a larger version at some point, with some of those little burritos in it!
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