At the Mill Pond #2 2021, oil, 16 x 16 in. Available from Hagan Fine Art, Charleston, SC Plein air
that seeks unconventional compositions, thus making what could simply be a nostalgic subject intriguing, and in part because Walker is an expert at painting the extraordinary light that occurs in nature for the briefest of moments. We may not have grown up in a part of the country where the barns are built in the manner of the one in The Day Ahead, but we’ve all seen those fleeting minutes when the bottom of a building is awash in the bluish tones of dawn or dusk shadows while the topmost part is glowing with the warmth of the sun on the horizon. “There’s a lot of memory involved in all of it,” Walker says of his body of work. “Some of it is from reference, but even if I use a picture of a scene, I have to take note, on location, of the little things that I won’t get from a photo. And I tell my students you are running uphill if you use someone else’s photo, because you don’t get that direct interaction with the subject.”
MATERIAL MATTERS Walker makes his own panels and tones them a vibrant orange. He likes to paint on Dibond, a product with a polyethylene core sandwiched between aluminum sheets, which offers significant strength for its weight. The artist buys 4 x 8-foot sheets and cuts them to the size and format he wants. In order for DTM bonding primer to adhere, he must remove the protective plastic film from the Dibond and scuff the surface, then apply several layers of primer, sanding between coats. “That’s basically my gesso,” he says. “I cut the sheets into custom sizes for commissions or for my own concepts that call for a non-standard format.” The artist also likes ABS (acrylonitrile butadiene styrene), a polymer blend that is about the same weight as Dibond but is sturdier, resisting damages to its corners if bumped. He must sand the gloss off the ABS and use only In Park 2021, oil, 8 x 8 in. Collection the artist Plein air
www.outdoorpainter.com / August-September 2021
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