PleinAir Magazine

Get your PleinAir Magazine digital subscription today and join tens of thousands of artists and collectors who have joined a new plein air movement. Rooted in a deep history, each bi-monthly issue, edited by Kelly Kane, chronicles important events and spotlights today’s master artists, their techniques, the collectors who follow them, as well as the historic artists who came before them.

PLEIN AIR Heritage

PleinAir Magazine

Making the Season Sweeter

Go Outside. Paint Something.

Pastel Spotlight

PLEIN AIR PAINTERS OF NEW MEXICO | papnm.org

PleinAir Magazine

Nobody Expected the Ozarks to Be This Good • The Missouri-Arkansas backcountry didn’t top anyone’s bucket list. Then the mist rolled into the hollows. The light hit the bluffs. And five days later, nobody wanted to leave.

This Year's Most-Talked-About Gear • Five popular products from PACE 2026

Where We're Headed in 2027 • Mark your calendars: Next year, the Plein Air Convention & Expo is headed to Zion and Bryce Canyon where strong value contrasts, shifting color temperature, and clear desert light offer painters more than inspiration. They offer a complete education.

Learn From the Best • Matt Smith. Andy Evansen. And 73 more reasons to be in St. George next May

Plein Air SALON • PLEINAIR MAGAZINE PRESENTS THE WINNERS OF THE 15TH ANNUAL COMPETITION.

The Beauty of the Built Environment

The Patient Painter • In an age of instant everything, Kyle Ma takes his time — scouting locations, studying the light, earning each brushstroke before he makes it.

Where Wildlife Meets the Landscape • The question isn’t how to paint an animal. It’s how to paint the world the animal lives in — and once you understand the difference, your paintings will never look the same.

Back Roads & Sacred Ground • The old adobe churches of northern New Mexico have been shaped by the same forces that shaped the land around them — sun, wind, earth, and time. For Walt Gonske, they have also shaped a career.

TOO MUCH — AND NEVER ENOUGH • India doesn’t ease you in — it arrives all at once, in noise, color, crowds, and light unlike anything most Western painters have ever faced. On a recent trip, 11 artists from the Arteva Club got more than they bargained for, and still came home wanting more.

Planning Your Own Painting Trip to India • What painters who have been there want you to know.

Local Color • Before the scene is chosen, before the easel is set up, before a single mark is made — a pastelist’s palette tells you everything about where they paint.

Events • EVERY FIRST-YEAR ARTIST SOLD. THAT SAYS SOMETHING.

PRIZE • CATHERINE SAKS, OWNER OF SAKS GALLERY, GIVES HIGH MARKS TO THESE PAINTINGS FROM THE APRIL COMPETITION.

PRIZE • MASTER ARTIST CINDY BARON NAMES HER TOP PICKS FROM THE MAY COMPETITION.

Postcards from the Road