Hot spring day, Coffee Park

I stopped by Coffee Park on lunch hour and sat down in a relatively peaceful corner of the park. This is a typical scene in the parks of Montreal, a field of grass, some dandelions, tall trees, a path, apartments in the background. The building just behind the trees is the back of City Fruiterie where we often buy fruit and discounted Lindt chocolate. To do a painting like this, I start with a basic outline using diluted carbon black (PBk6). Then I build up the foreground and background elements, fill in the details, and overlay the dark trees and brickwork. The dandelions are painted as negative shapes, that is, I paint the green grass leaving little circles, then fill in with a mix of yellow (PY175) and a dab of orange (PO62).

Hot Spring Day, Coffee Park, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, May 2022 (No. 3110b)

Tree blossoms on campus

 

As the weather heats up the trees are starting to go full bloom. Its hard to believe summer has not officially started yet. At lunch time I got out to eat in the campus quad and made a quick painting of one of the crab apple trees which had thousands of little pink flowers. The tree texture was built up in successive layers from light to dark. I found the perylene green (PBk31) was good for the shadow on the grass, but too dark for the tree itself. Next time I would cut it with some indo yellow (PY110). Sometimes I write these notes to myself, this blog is like an art diary as much as a way to share the work. It is nice to paint in the warm weather after some brutally cold winter painting that I did from December to February. Soon I will only be able to paint early in the day or late at night if it keeps on getting hotter.
 Tree blossoms on campus, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, May 2022 (No. 3111a)

New Leaves on Campus

 

You would never know it but this painting was done on campus. During my lunch break I had a seat on the terraced seating area under a tree to get some shade. The tree leaves were very interesting and almost poetic. It is a very challenging painting considering the simplistic subject matter. The yellow and chartreuse of the leaves can not overlap with the blue. To paint a scene like this, the shapes of the leaves have to painted first, then the background, then the darker leaves and branch details. At least you can imagine me staring up into the sky with my paint set in hand. A few people called out and wanted to see what I was doing and I showed them the painting. 

New Leaves on Campus, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, May 2022 (No. 3110a)

World Inspired Landscapes: Gambia

 

Gambia is a small, narrow country in the West coast of Africa, it is defined by the Gambian River. Like many of the countries in this region, they are rich in natural resources such as petro-chemicals and timber. Unfortunately deforestation is a major problem, the great Congo basin jungle is the second largest in the world next to the shrinking Amazon rain forest. There are conservation efforts within Gambia and internationally to preserve this precious landscape for the wildlife and for lucrative eco-tourism. Tourists do visit Gambia to see the animals, they even have a famous safari trail called Ninki Nanka trail. That name refers to a fictional monster that parents invoke to scare their children. Part giraffe, part crocodile, the Ninki Nanka will eat alive any child who misbehaves!

World Inspired Landscapes: Gambia version 2, watercolour 8 x 10" Strathmore aquarius ii, May 2022 (No. 3014b)

Here is a preliminary test I made on a small cutting. The colours worked well but the beast needed to be a bit more camouflaged by the landscape. For the Gambia paintings I used a pure earth palette from Stoneground Paint Company: the yellows and browns are ochres, the darks are umbers, and the green is nicosia green earth. The blue is lapis lazui, a special edition mineral-based paint from Schmincke company. version 1

1 x 4" cold press (No. 3115a)

Fire Station, New Leaves

 Painting just before sundown, I found this scene on Someled avenue where the sunlight was just catching the top of the fire station. There was an interesting contrast between the new leaves on the trees and the variety of brick colours from the various buildings. The fire station's bricks are coloured with yellow ochre which is kind of rare to see in the neighborhood.

Fire Station, New Leaves, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, May 2022 (No. 3109b)

Sunday Paint Trip, a Journey Northwards

The Hippodrome was a horse racing track with a large grandstand that would have blocked this entire view. The road is in severe disrepair, you can see the patchwork of craters and piles of asphalt. Cars were slowing down a lot here, probably not to watch me paint but to avoid the pot holes. Artistically the road was a lot of fun to paint, the greys varied from cool to warm, and the textures were a challenge to reproduce. There was also a large 3 meter heavy fencing on the divider blocks but I edited the fence out so as not to cover the view of the field and skyline.

View of Old Hippodrome, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, May 2022 (No. 3108a)

 

A pedestrian and bike path goes under the autoroute 40 giving access to the north part of the island, technically this an area called Bois-Franc. A sprawling warehouse greets you, it is painted in a bright green with orange, yellow and purple trim. The bricks are painted cream white. Complementing the gaudy colours are a bright red fire hydrant and bright yellow dandelions. It was a daunting scene to paint, not much room for error. The orange was a mix of benzi orange (PO62) and pyrol red (PR254). The green was phthalo green (PG7) with a daub of yellow ochre (PY43). The fire hydrant of course was pyrol red, with perylene maroon (PR179) for shadows.

Colourful warehouse, watercolour 8 x 10" Strathmore aquarius ii, May 2022 (No. 3014a)

 

On the way back I stopped off at Confederation park where I found the swimming pool still empty since 2020. It was looking worse for wear, I hope they can maintain it and start using it again for the public to swim. The blue was mainly done with phthalo blue (PB15) and phthalo green (PG7). The dark blue shadow was indo blue (PB60). I was running on fumes here but managed to eke out a decent painting.

Blue pool and umbrella, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, May 2022 (No. 3109a)

Tulips, Cavendish Underpass

 

I made a short bike ride up to a location where I made a painting of tulips back in 2020. The Cavendish underpass that heads up to Cote St. Luc is landscaped with shrubbery and pink tulips that have just started to rise up. There were also dandelions and fresh pine cones surrounding the garden. For contrast, I painted the Cavendish road and the underpass using a variety of greys, which I am very adept at capturing. It will take a few tries to get all the greens and yellows right. With each season comes a new palette of colours.

Tulips, Cavendish Underpass, watercolour 6 x 8" Aquarius II, May 2022 (No. 3004b)