Cloud, clouds everywhere

These nimbostratus clouds covered Virginia on Friday, October 28th. Nimbostratus are our frequent rain clouds that cover the sky and provide day-long showers. That is in contrast to the nimbocumulus clouds which are associated with thunderstorms and sudden, violent showers.


I painted these clouds at 6 pm facing the west. The air was so cool (about 36 degrees F) we also had sleet in the early evening, just before this painting was made.


Since clouds are so amorphous, it seemed a good time to quote part of Goethe's poem "To the Honoured Memory of Howard" honoring Luke Howard, a Quaker, whose 1820 classification of cloud types inspired so many artists and scientists:

     But with pure mind Howard gives us

     His new doctrine's most glorious prize:
     He grips what cannot be held, cannot be reached,
     He is the first to hold it fast,
     He give precision to the imprecise, confines it,
     Names it tellingly--yours be the honour!--
    Whenever a streak (of clouds) climbs, piles itself  

     together. scatters, falls,
    May the world gratefully remember you.

And, we do.

High cirrus clouds on October 18th

Cirrus clouds are high in the atmosphere and are teased into wispy shapes by the strong winds. They have a challenging shape to paint since they are made of ice crystals and are both reflective and transparent.


These clouds came by at about noon in the east and seem to foretell the coming rain at night. Cirrus clouds can be formed by a warm front moving over cool air.


Amusingly, Goethe likens cirrus clouds to "tiny lambs" in his poem on this cloud type.

Overcast at night

October 16th was cool and clear until night when a blanket of clouds covered the sky in advance of a weather change. These altostratus clouds covered the sky in diagonal undulations with lower clouds reflecting back the ambient light at about 9:30 pm in the eastern sky.


Altostratus clouds are gray or blue-gray middle-level clouds composed of ice crystals and water droplets. These clouds usually cover the entire sky. Altostratus clouds often form ahead of storms that will produce continuous precipitation.


Here's an excerpt from Goethe's poem entitled "Stratus":


Then the mist raises itself upon the mountain,
Broadly piling up streak on streak (of cloud), so that far and wide
The middle air is wrapped in gloom, equally favourable
Either to its falling as rain or rising airily.

More gray today

The rainy weather continues. These white or light gray clouds against a dark violet-gray background were visible in the south at about 11 am in Doswell, Virginia this morning. Notice the thumb print on the left in the lower third of the edge. Amazing how many grays there are and how many different grays can be mixed. I love the way the colors separate out at the edges of the paint so you can see the alizarin crimson more than the blues or yellows. And, the French ultramarine blue separates and floats on top.


Here's a rainy cloud poem from Goethe:


Stratus


When from the still mirror of the plain of water
A mist begins to raise its level carpet,
And the moon joins the curling of this apparition
And like a ghost seems forming ghosts,
Then Nature, we are all, we must admit,
Quickened and delighted children.


The the mist raises itself upon the mountain'
Broadly piling up streak (of cloud), so that far and wide
The middle air is wrapped in gloom, equally favorable
Either to its falling as rain or rising airily.


Goethe was inspired by Luke Howard's article entitled The Shape of Clouds according to Howard (1820) and his essay On the Modification of Clouds (1822). He wrote a poem for each of the shapes that Howard described. John Constable probably also had read Howard's work and thought Howard had much to learn.