Yellow Sky Winding Road

When I arrived in Montreal in 2005 I began a new page of my life, and also a new page in my art. I began to experiment with a technique where the paint is applied in excess (it forms 'lakes' on the paper), and allowed to dry over night. By the next day you get a surprise, the paint always settles in an unpredictable way and creates ripples and colour-blends. Then I try to imagine what it could be.

This painting depicts a mountain with hints of trees and a winding road that leads to an embankment in the foreground. Two people stand on the embankment looking at the purple mountain and yellow clouds (is it a sunset?). All of the small details were painted on top of the dried colours. Finally, I spray water over the finished work with a spray-bottle, and press it under a heavy board in order to flatten out the paper.

Yellow Sky Winding Road, watercolour 11 x 14" cold press, 2005 (No. 1387)

Birdman

This was a painting done in 2000 when I was living in a basement apartment in London, Ontario. The scene depicts an imaginary city (on a far off planet?) with an evening dancing party on a terrace. Four people dance happily while the birdman, off to the left watches them. The dancer in the foreground has a free right hand. Does he want to join them?

From a design perspective this painting was very lucky. I sat down to a blank piece of mat-board and this picture seemed to come out of the paintbrush with a life of it's own (this rarely happens with success!). In addition to luck, I used pictures from a Stratford festival booklet to get some inspiration for the characters. The result is a lively composition with an earthy coloured scheme. After the paint dried, outlines were applied with Chinese black ink. 

 

Birdman, mixed media 14 x 20"matting board, 2000 (No. 0037)

Barcelona, Spain

This painting was done in Barcelona, Spain
in 1998 on my Europe trip which took me to beautiful Paris, and around Spain. It was a very hot day in Spain, as usual for June, and I sat under some shrubs on a pile of yellow sand that turned out to be an ant hill. Luckily the ants were having their afternoon siesta and mostly left me alone. I am at the edge of the Olympic village looking towards the valley, the opposite hill is covered with urban developments.

The paint dried very fast in Spain because of the hot sun. The fast drying made it difficult to do wet techniques, so the bushes in the front are depicted with dry-brush lines and the clouds were done by blotting out the blue colour with a clean brush. It would only get hotter for me as I traveled farther south, reaching the rock of Gibraltar. Where is the snow?

 

Art Museum, Barcelona, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, 1998 (No. 0876)

Bethsheba, Barbados

I did this painting in St. Joseph, Bathsheba, Barbados, on the north side of the island which looks out onto the Atlantic ocean. The bus ride from the south coast was twisty and hilly and the bus was packed with people. That day there was a surfing competition, and after it was over there were so many people that it took 4 hours to get a bus back. However, this painting was the scene from the bus stop, so hey, it was an allright 4 hours.

The water was done with a number of techniques, the white wave crest was left unpainted (I do not use white paint), the splash effects were done by dropping clean water into the blue wash, and the reflections were done by glazing on top of the dried washes. 

Waves and Rocks, Barbados watercolour 5 x 8" cold press, 2001 (No. 1178)

blockheads and bright ideas

This painting is called "blockheads and bright ideas" it was painted some time in 2000. The painting depicts a group of people on a conveyor going through a machine that only lets through the blockheads and small bulbs. One fellow sits on a chair watching the process, avoiding the fate of the bright bulb-heads. There is also a symbol on the ground depicting flamingos, which has nothing to do with the message, it was something I copied off a Frisbee disk.


The painting could have many meanings. My inspiration was from the field of science, where sometimes the bright ideas get crushed and only mundane (safe) ideas flourish. Note that before the machine, the postures are dynamic and the bright heads create dramatic light and shadow, where after the machine the postures are linear and the lighting contrast is dull. The entire painting was done in dry-brush technique except for some of the shadowing which was wet-wet application.

 

Blockheads and Bright Ideas, watercolour 11 x 14" hot press, 2001 (No. 1873)

Algonquin Park

This scene, painted some time in the fall of 1999, was done in Algonquin provincial park, Ontario, Canada. I was on a camping trip with friends from Toronto that I had originally met in Spain on the Madrid train. The only interruption was flies, lots of them, I had to paint fast.

The sky was done by blending a deep purple with a pale yellow wet-wet. The purple was achieved with the opaque cerulean blue and the transparent rose matter genuine an a touch of the staining pigment alizarin crimson (notice how the red bleeds out the edge of the cloud, this is property of the staining pigments). The further in the distance, the colours become lighter and more blue by adding more cerulean and french ultramarine blue and less yellow.

 Algonquin Vista with Rock and Trees, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, 2001 (No. 0342)

Kyoto, Japan

This painting was done in Kyoto, Japan, in October 2006 after I attended a science conference in nearby Nagoya. A short walk from this location is the famous golden temple, which was too crowded by tourists to do paintings. What inspired me to do this scene was the contrast between the old and new Japan. The modern pop machines can be found on every corner it seemed, and they contain everything from pop to coffee and tea to cigarettes. To the right of the scene a shrine is depicted, where locals can drop off offerings. The shrines were also on every corner. The typical old-style architecture can be seen in the roof details.

The sky and trees were done first, wet in wet, leaving the space for the shrine and the building blank. The dark shadow under the pop machine anchors the composition, and the ground allows your eye to move up to the shrine and into the sky. It was a hot day so the paint dried quickly allowing for a lot of finishing detail in the buildings and foliage and machine. 

Temple and Vending Machine, Kyoto Japan, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, 2006 (No. 1203-2)

Banff, Alberta

This painting was done inside the Fairmont Springs Hotel in Banff, Alberta, December 2007. Outside you can see the bow valley surrounded by the Canadian Rockies. Inside a chair and table which were whisked away before I finished to make room for a party ( I wasn't invited). I was there for a multiple sclerosis conference, and did a presentation.The hotel was great, I enjoyed the heated pool.
The background sky and mountains were done first wet, the basis for the chair was done wet as well, you can see where the colour bleeds into the mountain. After drying, the foreground details, and tree details were built up. When painting indoors the water takes more time to dry, be patient!

 Banff Hotel, Interior and Exterior, watercolour 10 x 11" cold press 2007 (No. 1151)

 

New Blog, Notre Dame Cathedral, France

This is my watercolour blog. I hope to post new works, old works, and describe the decisions and inspirations behind each painting. Here I post a watercolour done on location, in 1998, in where else, Paris, of the Notre Dame cathedral. It is a view from the back of the cathedral, with the statue in the foreground. I am sitting in a small park where a man plays a string instrument (not in painting), mid way through a police officer takes the man away. I miss the music. This painting was done at the end of the trip, my confidence was very high, otherwise I would have never taken on such a detailed work. The base colours were applied in washes, and the details were done in drybrush. The painting took about 1h15min, a little longer than usual.

Notre Dame Cathedral, Paris, watercolour  4.5 x 7" cold press, 1998   (No. 0988b)