 
JOHN MACDONALD
Plein Air Painting as
Training to Overcome Fear
Plein air painting became part of John MacDonald’s process for dealing effectively with fear,
negative “self-talk,” and timidity; now the Massachusetts painter coaches other artists on ways
to surmount obstacles and relish the joy and fulfillment of creating art.
L
istening to John MacDonald describe his
fascinating career as a successful illustrator,
landscape painter, and occasional artist’s coach, it
is hard to understand how he once considered himself
to be timid, averse to taking risks, and anxious about
other people’s opinions of his artwork. “I was experiencing the same negative feelings that inhibit many
creative people, so I signed up for training with the
psychotherapist Eric Maisel, the author of Coaching
the Artist Within and several other important books,”
MacDonald explains. “His perceptions were so
revealing that I took training to become a coach,
not because I wanted another career, but because I
thought it would continue to help me deal with my
own issues.”
When MacDonald describes those issues, it
becomes clear that his concerns were those experienced by many painters. “Every artist has those
moments,” he says, “because it is part of the paradox
of being a creative person. The “paradox” he refers to
is that artists must pour their hearts and souls into
their work — and yet become accustomed to the fact
that much of that work will fail. They generally work
Old Woods Road
2012, oil, 12 x 9 in.
Collection the artist
Plein air
John
MacDonald
painting
in Western
Massachusetts
56
December-January 2013 / www.pleinairmagazine.com
Maisel and now as a teacher is simply to help
artists get back to work and to enjoy the creative
process. Learning takes place with a brush in
our hands, so the objective is to get past the
fears and start painting again.
“Plein air painting is superb training for
dealing with fear, in part because we don’t
invest as much time, energy, or materials in
the process as we do in the studio. Working
quickly, on the spot, and with the subject
constantly changing, can show us how we
manifest and react to fear. We become more
aware of all those subtle little games we play
with ourselves to avoid feeling the uncomfortable
emotions of fear and anxiety. We can use plein
air painting to help us learn to recognize,
understand, and then manage our fears. We
can keep a beginner’s mind and an open eye
and look intently at the visual information in
front of us, even while our minds are in panic
mode. Managing our fears and trusting in
the process is no guarantee that the painting
will succeed, but it does assure us we’ll have
an opportunity to learn and come out of the
experience as better painters.”
Learning From Failure
Quiet Waters
2012, oil, 12 x 9 in.
Collection the artist
Plein air
ARTIST DATA
NAME: John MacDonald
BIRTHDATE: 1957
LOCATION: Williamstown, MA
INFLUENCES: “Corot, George Inness,
American and French Impressionists,
Walter Palmer, Gustav Klimt, Frits
Thaulow, Isaac Levitan, Richard Crozier.”
WEBSITE: www.jmacdonald.com
MacDonald continues, “It’s precisely
when our paintings fail that we can learn
the most, and plein air painting is a brutally
honest teacher because it confronts us with
our artistic limitations. If we can manage our
fear and continue to paint honestly, then our
failures will help us become stronger and more
skilled painters. At that point they’re no longer
failures. Painting en plein air is unparalleled
training for the eye, the head, and the heart.
“Painting outdoors will invariably attract
curious onlookers. Occasionally, at the end of a
conversation — hopefully brief! — a bystander
alone, motivated by private feelings, and yet
they create work for public display. They search will say something like, ‘But even when a
painting doesn’t work out, isn’t it great to be
for original ways to express themselves, and
yet they use a visual language other people can outside in this beautiful scene?’ Yes, it truly is.
Whether the painting is destined for the wall
understand.
of a museum or the trash can, in the process of
“Fear is the biggest obstacle we face, and
painting we open our eyes to the miraculous
it manifests itself in many different ways,”
interplay of color and light and texture. We get
MacDonald says. “Most of it results from the
lost in the joy of feeling wind on the face, the
‘self-talk’ conversations we have with ourselves
incredible music of moving water and dancing
when we think our work is failing, when we
leaves, and the feeling of being an integral part
wonder if we might actually be frauds, or in
of it all.”
situations when our work might be rejected
As you might expect, MacDonald believes
or harshly criticized. Any of those fears can
so strongly in the value of painting outdoors
cause us to fall back on old habits and avoid
that he constantly challenges himself to experitaking risks, but ultimately we get bored with
repetition. My number one goal as a student of ment, avoid comfortable routines, and enjoy
www.pleinairmagazine.com / December-January 2013
57
 
the complete experience. As an example of his willingness to risk change, MacDonald
shifted from an extensive palette of colors and limited himself to only four tube colors.
He says, “In June of this year, I switched over to a very limited palette that includes
white — titanium and zinc mixture — Prussian blue, alizarin crimson, and cadmium
yellow light. I’ve been surprised and pleased at the incredible range of colors that can be
mixed with those few colors, especially the range of greens.
“I rarely include buildings in my landscapes — unless it’s the rare cityscape — and
never the human figure. I want my landscapes to be about a specific time, place, and
atmosphere, so I avoid detracting from that by including narrative content. I am more
interested in capturing the specific color and tonal relationships in a landscape than in
telling a story.”
The Power Of Suggestion
MacDonald goes on, “In general, I don’t believe landscape paintings need a blatantly
obvious focal point. That’s something people bring to the paintings. I want a viewer to
do a certain amount of wandering around in my paintings. A fixed strong focal point
can actually pull a viewer into a picture so quickly that they don’t experience a sense
of discovery. Generally speaking, I prefer suggesting details and specific elements in a
Young’s Stream
2012, oil, 12 x 9 in.
Collection the artist
Plein air
58
December-January 2013 / www.pleinairmagazine.com
Summer Heat
2012, oil, 12 x 16 in.
Collection the artist
Plein air
Last Light
2012, oil, 24 x 36 in.
Private collection
Plein air
Fire and Ice
2012, oil, 12 x 16 in.
Collection the artist
Plein air
painting rather than describing them completely.
I came to this from a love of traditional Japanese
and Chinese painters, who had a genius for reducing a scene to its bare essentials without ever losing
the sense that it was a real and specific place. They
never stylized a landscape — or bird, plant, or
human — to the point that the image became
merely a generic symbol. That’s what I’d like to do
with my landscapes: capture a specific moment in a
specific place, reduce it to its essentials, hint at the
complexity of the landscape rather than describe
every leaf and blade of grass, and let a viewer make
some discoveries of his or her own.
“I often say that plein air painting can be
thought of as downhill skiing, whereas painting
in the studio is like cross-country skiing. Downhill
skiing is fast, risky, and precarious, and we never
quite know what’s going to happen. In contrast, in
www.pleinairmagazine.com / December-January 2013
59
 
Autumn Dawn
2012, oil, 12 x 9 in.
Collection the artist
Plein air
60
December-January 2013 / www.pleinairmagazine.com
Expanded Digital Edition Content
 
Meadow Path
2012, oil, 12 x 9 in.
Private collection
Plein air
cross-country skiing we have to remain focused on what is ahead of us. It
depends on a steady pace, endurance, and perseverance.”
MacDonald notes, “Those of us who paint in the studio invariably
rely on photographs. They’re often an important and necessary resource
for painters. But even the most expensive camera can’t compete with the
astonishing sensitivity of the human eye. It’s through repeated painting in
front of raw nature that we train the eye to see clearly and sensitively, and
consequently we learn the limitations of the camera.
“We discover that a camera cannot capture many of the subtle tonal
and color relationships found in nature, nor the way in which light reveals
form. Painting en plein air vastly expands our visual vocabulary as we
become much more knowledgeable and skilled in seeing and understanding
tone, color, and the interplay of light and form.
“It is also true that paintings created en plein air fail at a much higher
rate than studio paintings. There’s no avoiding it. But it’s tough to fail. No
one enjoys looking like a rank beginner. Failing repeatedly gives our selfconfidence a thrashing and then goes for our jugular as it inevitably evokes
anxiety and fear.”
But as MacDonald’s own experience demonstrates, with time and
thoughtful consideration, even these fears can be addressed and overcome.
John MacDonald received a B.F.A. from Washington University
and spent four months studying printmaking at the Institute for American
Universities in Avignon, France. After returning to the U.S., he earned
an M.A. degree in drawing and painting from Purdue University. For 30
years after that, he worked as a full-time freelance illustrator and landscape
painter, and became certified through the Creativity Coaching Association
as a creativity coach. His paintings have been exhibited within a number of
galleries and art centers, and he has taught painting workshops in Western
Massachusetts, where he lives, and in other locations.
M. Stephen Doherty is Editor of PleinAir magazine
See more paintings by John MacDonald in the expanded
digital edition of PleinAir.
www.pleinairmagazine.com / December-January 2013
Expanded Digital Edition Content
 
Dawn, After the Storm
2012, oil, 8 x 10 in.
Collection the artist
Plein air
December-January 2013 / www.pleinairmagazine.com
Expanded Digital Edition Content
 
Morning on the Hoosac
2012, oil, 9 x 12 in.
Collection the artist
Plein air
www.pleinairmagazine.com / December-January 2013
Expanded Digital Edition Content
 
Stream Golds
2012, oil, 24 x 30 in.
Private collection
Studio
www.pleinairmagazine.com / December-January 2013