Painting Objectives -What they are makes all the difference

This morning I read a blog point by Stapleton, in which he makes a list of what is not in nature....which you can read at your leisure.
My response is below, although I understand where he is coming from, as a plein air painter, one of the most important skills to develop is the ability to respond to those unique ideas which nature presents which you would never think of in a million years. To set up your easel with alot of the design elements selected from your point of view and then nature puts something in there which just ices the cake. To see beautiful color combinations and upon further study actually see combinations which work and drive you to another level of painting. Going on location with preconceived ideas of what you can or won't paint to me as a painter on location will act as an inhibitor of capturing the unique moment presented to you. My objectives in painting a scene or a seascape are different. This is why I believe that art should be judged not by what someone else is doing but by what your objectives are. If an artist sets out to capture the sea on a misty morning, then the language of the painting should convey that to the viewer. The better you do the communication in paint the more the response.

I also have painted water for over 30 years now, and very few artists (no offense) actually understand its movement. It is rich and complex and if it attracts you in real life don't you think that it has something which needs to be discovered? Also color is not just surface color, there are three dimensions to color. In water translucent color vs opaque color is a big issue, in grasses there are underlying colors, middle range depth colors and surface colors. These are just some of the missing things from the discussions.

If you ARE about capturing the beauty of nature instead of painting a pretty picture in your head then these things should be important for you to consider. Nature is as rich and varied as you can get, studying it will reveal all sorts of things which you could NEVER dream up in your studio. Just like painting from a live model is going to create a much more vibrant piece than painting from a photo of a model.

Here is my answer to the blog entry:
"I think Stape, that you are an intellectual painter. I like to paint using my head too but I like to do it before I begin painting so that I can respond to my environment (when on location). Lots of trial an error have allowed me to learn an intuitive positive negative response to things which occur while I'm painting.

When I paint I DO find the design within nature 1st, look for the color combinations that I want to work with, pick the time of day which is most likely going to cause the lighting effects which I wish to use, and in seascapes I like to remain faithful to the natural movement of the waves, otherwise why not just paint back in the studio and make it up. I see so many unnatural looking water movements and wave paintings by those who "think" they know what the water is doing.

My objectives in painting are not "just" to create a beautiful painting but to "capture the moment" in which I am painting which requires a certain amount of faithfulness to the subject. It is also going to create works which are hard to replicate BECAUSE you can't go back an paint a particular combination of things which doesn't happen every night or every year or even every lifetime. To me capturing rare moments is what it is all about. Finding the universal within the rare moments is another level.
Each artist can have their bag of tricks and have their approach to painting but what is or is not in the bag depends on the objectives.
I don't want to be able to replicate my works, I want to create originals in as many different ways as possible."