Before heading out to Amsterdam for the conference (and our short vacation) I went around town practicing a few landscapes in town. It had been a while since I made location paintings and I wanted to test out my setup and get a bit of practice in. If you haven't painted in awhile it takes a few days to get in the groove again, so my hope was to arrive on site already 'in the groove'. These buildings are on Somerled Av. near our apartment, the one on the left is a Jean Coutu pharmacy. The building look like they are falling over, which was not intentional, ironically many of the buildings in Amsterdam also looked like they were falling over as they are all built in sand using deep piles.
Apartment and pharmacy on Somerled Avenue, 5 x 7" hot press, watercolour, August 2018
Luckily enough, there were a few flower planters with sunflowers, what better way to prepare for a painting trip. This one was near the end of its growth and the flowers were twisted, browned and falling off. I tried to channel my inner Van Gogh for this one! Introducing the background apartment was extremely difficult, the window details are hard enough, when inserted between flowers and leaves it was even harder, and the cool humid weather made the paint run a bit. None the less it does the job of portraying an urban flower garden.
Urban Sunflowers Last Blooms on Somerled Avenue, 5 x 7" hot press, watercolour, August 2018
This was another urban flower planter with giant sunflowers. This year (2020) they didn't plant anything because of the pandemic lock-down, but I noticed that sunflowers were growing in and around the planters anyways! In the background barely visible is the Metro grocery store, the paint was really running around with the humidity and failing sunlight. I posted this one before.
Urban Sunflowers on Somerled Avenue, 5 x 7" hot press, watercolour, August 2018
No comments:
Post a Comment