Ann Craven


I don't usually let people up there when I am painting the moon because it is too distracting. Time moves too quickly and the night sky changes too fast to have visitors.

The moon was rising so fast that evening. It was full, and the sky was yellow, purple, and green haze from the lights of Harlem. I love that memory. I had just arrived back from Maine that week. I was thinking that the sky in Maine was so much different than the sky in Harlem. The density of the air in Harlem held the color so much better. It suspended the color and kept it there longer for me to see.

It was a bright and clear night, but the outer space in the sky was crowded with thick atmosphere. The lights from all the buildings turning on and off and changing color was also changing the color of the sky. The close-up sky was purple and orange, and the more-distant sky had more brown. It looked like the color "raw umber," one of my favorite colors, and I remember using a lot of raw umber that fall when I mixed the color of the sky.