Oil painter Julie Davis, AIS, AWA, OPA has a favorite quote from Winston Churchill that hints at her philosophy of painting: “Obviously, then, armed with a paint-box, one cannot be bored, one cannot be left at a loose end, one cannot ‘have several days on one’s hands,’ Good gracious! What there is to admire and how little time there is to see it in!”
For Julie Davis, the more you look the more there is to see – and paint. “The scenes I choose to paint are rarely nature’s standouts,” she says. “The introvert in me gravitates to the quiet of the landscape and the bits of our surroundings that don’t receive regular pause,” she says. “I like for my work to celebrate the forms and figures in nature that are worthy of, but unaccustomed to, our attention. I’m drawn to the individual expressions of trees and the curious lines of long-forgotten structures.”
A first-time PleinAir Salon entrant, Davis took top honors in two categories, Best Landscape and Best Building in the October 2024 Salon.
Best Building: Julie Davis, “Leaning Toward the Past,” oil, 18×24 in. (PleinAir Salon, October 2024)
Gouache
Davis makes regular use of gouache in her practice. Gouache is water-based, opaque paint medium that behaves like watercolor but has the solidity and opacity of oils. “It dries quickly and I paint in a small 8″ x 5.5″ watercolor sketchbook,” she says. “Like my outdoor oil studies, these are often my first impressions of a place.”
She finds her gouache studies are a popular and cost-conscious way for collectors to acquire her work, and she sells them both in her galleries and through her website.
Gouache plein air by Julie Davis
“I really love it when I’m pressed for time or somewhere not on a dedicated painting trip,” she says. “It’s efficient and I can complete a study in a half an hour, and I can be packed up minutes later because it dries so quickly.”
“I’ll also use it in the studio after I’ve done a plein air oil study to further work out the composition or colors,” she said. “It gives me another opportunity to rehearse the piece and to work through any issues before I tackle a studio oil painting.”
Gouache plein air by Julie Davis
Gouache plein air by Julie Davis
Julie Davis was born in Galveston, Texas and raised in towns across West Texas from El Paso To Abilene. She grew up drawing and creating and earned degrees from Baylor University in education and law. After she and her husband started a family, Davis worked as a freelance writer and explored black and white photography, photographing the landscape and her daughters, and learning about composition and light in the process.
In 2007, she had the opportunity to satisfy her lifelong curiosity to study oil painting, and quickly learned that it brought all of her interests together–her adoration of the outdoors, drawing, photography, writing, even law–all of it had a place in painting. She studied with some of the preeminent landscape painters in the country, and she continues to challenge herself so that she might elegantly demonstrate her respect for our landscape on canvas. Davis lives in Austin with her husband, Ben; their three adult daughters live and work in Texas and New York.
Gouache plein air by Julie Davis
A Signature Member of Oil Painters of America, the American Impressionist Society, and American Women Artists, Davis has won awards in OPA, AIS, and AWA national shows. Her plein air work earned Best of Show in the 2023 American Impressionist Society’s (AIS) All Member Paintout in Knoxville, TN, the 2019 AIS Central Park Paintout in New York City, and Best of Show in the 2013 and 2014 Kerrville Outdoor Painters Events in Texas. Plein Air Magazine featured Davis in the June/July 2020 issue and Southwest Art Magazine’s Editor selected her as an Artist to Watch for the September 2017 issue. In 2023 her work earned an Award of Excellence at the OPA Master’s Show from judge Scott Christensen. Davis teaches online and in-person workshops when her schedule allows. Her work can be found at Mockingbird Gallery in Bend, Oregon, Mary Williams Fine Arts in Boulder, CO, and Davis Gallery in Austin. Her paintings can also be viewed on Instagram (@juliedavisstudio).
“This was my first time to enter the Plein Air Salon competition,” she noted. “It’s a huge honor to receive accolades in two categories and I’m extremely grateful.I feel that the Plein Air Salon competition has the potential to give me exposure in a different way than the others do. All the competitions have their differences, I like to choose those that align with my goals for a certain period and work towards success in them.”
“As for entering art competitions in general, for me, they’ve been extremely valuable. Initially, I chose to focus on a few specific competitions, with the goal of getting into those and building to Signature status (OPA, AIS, AWA). I’ve been fortunate to be juried into those national and regional shows now repeatedly, and I’ll continue to apply to them—it’s real affirmation to be juried in, to win awards, and to go to the shows and build friendships with other artists.”
The monthly PleinAir Salon rewards artists with over $50,000 in cash prizes and exposure of their work. A winning painting, chosen annually from the monthly winners, is featured on the cover of PleinAir magazine. The deadline is ongoing, so visit PleinAirSalon.com to learn more.
Free Tutorials on Using Gouache
Rachel Dowd is bananas about gouache.
If you are interested in learning more about gouache paints and how plein air painters and other artists use them to enhance their practice, check out these YouTube video demos and interviews:
