For May the weather has been remarkably good, I can't remember a time when March, April up until now was so amiable for painting outdoors. There have been a few cold and rainy times, but for the most part clear blue skies and tolerable temperatures. This scene was painted up at the Fleet Street and Cavendish intersection where they have landscaped the area with nice trees and flower beds that are just now sprouting tulips. It is the third painting I did up there, mostly because there were some great places to sit while keeping distance with the walkways. Unfortunately the traffic has picked up significantly as of late, and it really made this location unpleasant. Up on a hill side, my butt was literally vibrating from the construction trucks, recycling trucks, and buses rumbling down Cavendish. I captured one of the recycling trucks in the upper middle of this scene.
I packed a lot of detail into this small painting, there are hundreds of elements including two types of flowers (tulips and dandelions). To accommodate everything I started with a fairly detailed outline using diluted black paint and then worked up the details one by one. The last element was the tulips and dandelions. I saved them for last because I wanted to properly judge the colour. If you put the colourful things in first they could end up looking pale and faded at the end. It was still offa little though, so I added red, orange and yellow washes where needed to enhance the tints. The 'PJD 2020' signature that I adopted this year is hidden on the street sign in the foreground.
5 x 7" cold press, watercolour May 2020
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