Painting The Haze Of Hot Summer Days

How to convey a hot and hazy day in art and illustration?

Edges are soft, especially the horizon (or anything in the distance. The colour palette becomes more analogous. Highlights are high key. Blues and purples may be used to depict landscapes in the distance.

Peder Severin Krøyer (Danish painter) 1851-1909 Fisherman On The Beach At Skagen 1891
Peder Severin Krøyer (Danish painter) 1851-1909 Fisherman On The Beach At Skagen 1891
‘Tangiers from the Marshes.’ (1905) Alexander Mann (African coast)
The Beach at Cascais (1953) Edward Seago
‘The Fishermen’s Regatta, Brittany.’ Painted in 1943 by the Scottish artist David Macbeth Sutherland
Petros Malayan (Armenian painter, 1927 Baku – 1997 Tel Aviv-Jaffa) Birds’ Arrival 1967
Willem Van Hasselt (Dutch, 1882-1963) Arcachon, The Basin
Midsummer Theodor Kittelsen 1908
‘Cessnock in Summer,’ (1938), William Crosbie (who was influenced by French Surrealists)
Haze with light shining through, by artist Yakov Khaimov, 1914-1991
Ramon Casas i Carbó (1866-1932) Barcelona, Cataluña
Achille Laugé (French, 1861 – 1944) blossom Tree, 1893

‘Tonalism was an artistic style that emerged in the 1880s when American artists began to paint landscape forms with an overall tone of colored atmosphere or mist. Between 1880 and 1915, dark, neutral hues such as gray, brown or blue, often dominated compositions by artists associated with the style.’ (Wikipedia)

Clarice Marjoribanks Beckett (Australian artist and a key member of the Australian tonalist movement) 1887-1935.
Clarice Marjoribanks Beckett
Clarice Marjoribanks Beckett
Philip Wilson Steer, children on the beach at Étaples (1887)
Philip Wilson Steer ‘Tired Out,’ Suffolk Coast 1884
Contemplation (Woman Seated Next To Birdcage) 1913 Richard Edward Miller (American 1875-1943
Joaquim Sorolla (1863-1923) Spain
Day of Yellow Flowers (detail), 1956 Tom Lovell (1907-1997). This illustration uses the palette of an outside hazy day.
Tending the Garden 1912 Marie Duhem (French,1871-1918
Vyacheslav Fedorovich Shumilov ( 1931 – 2004) Spring, 1966
Richard Edward Miller (American painter) 1875-1943
Richard Edward Miller (American painter) 1875-1943
Spring in Italy (1890) by Isaac Levitan
Stonehenge (1909) by Albert Goodwin (English, 1845-1932)
Stonehenge (1909) by Albert Goodwin (English, 1845-1932)
Sunshine and haze (1915) by Charles Courtney Curran (American, 1861-1942)
Sunshine and haze (1915) by Charles Courtney Curran (American, 1861-1942)
Daniel Gaeber (1880 - 1958) Primavera al Villaggio, 1920
Daniel Gaeber (1880 – 1958) Primavera al Villaggio, 1920. For more paintings and drawings of villages, see here.
‘Early Morning, Newlyn’, Dod Procter, oil on canvas, 1926. This one is a picture of an early morning, but utilises the same hazy purple palette as some of these other paintings set later in the day.
Eagle Feather illustrator Viktor Britvin
Vanity Fair Magazine Cover art by Jean Pages 1929
Girl On A Coastal Path (1893) by Edmund Blair Leighton (British, 1853-1922)
Girl On A Coastal Path (1893) by Edmund Blair Leighton (British, 1853-1922)
Town of Evening Calm, Country of Cherry Blossoms by Fumiyo Kouno
Anna Ancher (Danish painter) 1859-1935 Young Girl With Orange Umbrella
Anna Ancher (Danish painter) 1859-1935 Young Girl With Orange Umbrella
Country Gentleman Magazine July 1938
Country Gentleman Magazine July 1938
by me

The painting below is not of a ‘hot summer day’, but is instead the haze of a winter morning. How are the colours different?

‘The Road, Winter Morning’, George Clausen, oil on canvas, 1923

FURTHER READING

Air pollution had a huge influence on Claude Monet’s creative work. Overall, the contamination of air helped him create the dreamy, misty paintings. His paintings shaped the Impressionist movement.

Air Pollution Inspired Monet’s the Dreamlike Haze Work from The Collector

Header painting: Sand, Sea and Sky, a Summer Phantasy (1892) by John Atkinson Grimshaw (England, 1836-1893)

LATEST AUDIOBOOK (short story for children)

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