The landscape in the Netherlands, particularly in the lowlands, is largely sky.

This seems to suit contemporary Dutch plein air painter Roos (pronounced like “Rose”) Schuring just fine.

She loves to portray cloud filled skies of all kinds. Though she paints in all weather and conditions, she finds particular magic in the dramatic skies just before and after storms.

This is evident in her recent seascapes, in which the coast of the Netherlands seems to readily accommodate her preference for skies full of roiling clouds, rich with subtle colors and value changes.

Looking back through her blog, you will also find subjects like rows of farmed flowers, fields, livestock and streams.

In particular, she returns often to the same water meadow and paints it in different light and atmospheric conditions, a practice favored by Monet and Pissarro, and one I particularly enjoy. You can also see the tradition of cloud studies from sources like Constable’s oil sketches, and of course, the great Dutch landscape painters.

Schuring lets her thick, textural brushstrokes add a physical dimension to her portrayal of cloud forms, and her “gray” skies have a wonderful variety of depth and color.

There are a few videos of Schuring painting on location. Though they are unfortunately not professionally filmed they still show her working methods and give a closer view of her painting’s surface than the smaller images on her blog.

Schuring has a website in addition to her blog, but it serves mainly as a source of links to her other sites. Most of the images of her work are on her blog. There are additional images on her Facebook page, and in galleries on the Daily Paintworks site and the Fine Art America site.

She teaches workshops specifically in seascaping in The Netherlands.

It seems that many contemporary plein air painters are disappointed when the skies are overcast or threaten rain, but for Roos Shruring, that’s ideal painting weather.

When I wrote about Eric Bowman, an artist originally from California and now based in Oregon, back in 2008, he was transitioning from a successful illustration career into placing more emphasis on his gallery art.

He is now focusing primarily on his gallery painting and his website showcases his landscapes and figurative work, as well as including a selection of figure studies.

Bowman has an open, painterly style that fits well with his landscape subjects, which are often in the tradition of the early 20th century California landscape painters, but also venture into townscapes and industrial subjects. His figurative subjects include dancers, chefs, and a series of portraits of blues musicians.

In both areas of subject matter, Bowman is very interested in the play of light and the effects of sharp value transitions. He works with a vibrant but controlled palette that gives his compositions a sense of clear harmony.

I particularly enjoy his inviting scenes of tree shadowed paths down to the Pacific shoreline, and his “moment in time” portrayals of dancers preparing for practice.

His figure studies from life model sessions have that nice loose rendering characteristic of confidently done oil sketches.

Bowman also has a blog, on which he posts images of his work, often linked to larger versions than you will find on the website.

Sigh. Another day, another treasure trove of high resolution masterpieces on the Google Art Project — this one from the Museum of Fine Arts Budapest.

(Images above: Maximillian Lenz, Albrecht Dürer, Jean Baptiste Camille Corot, Leonardo da Vinci, Dominico Fetti, Arnold Böcklin, Renbrandt van Rijn, Claude Monet)