Mahe, Seychelles

The main island in the Seychelles is called Mahe, the hotel we were at was in the south of the island up the hill from this beach depicted in the painting. The colour of the water was very pure and filled with amazing yellows and blues. The colours of the water were echoed in the colour of the boat, as well as in the rich tones of the jungle in the background. If you look close there is a tiny crab in the bottom right of the painting, the beaches were all covered in the creatures, they lived in little holes in the beach that they dug and would pop out overy now and then.


Painting tropical water is always a challenge and I recommend that if you are an artist you should take every chance you get to practice, well even if you are not an artist it is highly recommended to spend some time at the beach! I learned a lot on this trip, for example, the shallow water near the beach front takes on the colours of the sand, so to paint it I mixed the sand colour first (a light yellow accented with peach and a touch of green), then when it came time to do the water colour, I used the same paint mixture from the palette, just adding a bit more yellow and some blue... then I added a bit more blue and merged the washes... in this way you can gradually change the color you are adding to create that smooth transition from beach to sea.

Mahe Island, Boat, Cove 5x6" cold press. 2011 (No. 1274)