Where in Montreal? with Spring Palette

A short bike ride brought me to a secret field, it is some kind of vacant lot or nature reserve I hope it is the latter since there is not much green space around yet. The city plans to plant thousands of trees along the highway embankments and new path. In the background is the mighty M2, Mount Royal, I omitted most of the houses and simplified the Oratory. Last week I painted a similar scene but from the North.

Field with view of Mount Royal, 4 x 6" cold press, watercolour, May 2021 (No. 2630a)

 

Next I rode over to Parc Ignace-Bourget which I had seen on the map and wanted to check out. There was a tall hill they made probably for tobogganing in the winter. In the summer it appears to be used for exercise, and a disc-golf course. Disc golf is like Ultimate but without a team. There were plenty of great views from the top of the hill, I will have to return when the trees fill out some more. Just beyond, was an enormous pile of what appeared to be melted snow from the snow removal. I don't know if there was actual snow or this was just the left-over gravel. Even though the great heap was close, it looked like a Himalayan mountain range, right here in Montreal!

Montreal Himalayas, 8 x 10" cold press, watercolour, May 2021 (No. 2655)

 

Finally I looped down to Parc Angrignon which was on the way back, and found this nice scene at the end of the little lake with no name. The trees were a distinctive dark yellowish, and the water reflections were a symphony of blue green and yellow. To get the water sparkle I dragged the brush quickly. This was on the new Fabriano cold press block I got, the quality is noticeably different than the d'Arches I just finished. The paper holds washes, dries bright, and is smooth feeling on the brush.

Symphony of Blue Green and Yellow 5 x 7" cold press, watercolour, May 2021 (No. 2631a)

After expanding my palette and making adjustments in April, it still felt a little too complicated, so I reduced down to 19 colours which is closer to what I used for years. I also adjusted swapped venetian red out and added perylene maroon for increased chroma. Here it is although they are actually on the larger palette, I drew them here like on a smaller palette: 

top row:

yellow Ochre (PY43)

umber (PBr7)

raw umber (PBr7)

burnt yellow ochre (PR102)

perylene maroon (PR179)

bone black (PBk6)

indo blue (PB60)

perylene black (PBk31) actually a dark green

phthalo green yellow shade (PG36)

leaf green (PY154+PG7)

benzi lemon yellow (PY175)

 

bottom row:

benzi yellow (PY154)

isoindo orange-yellow (PY110)

pyrol vermillion, orange-red (PR255)

ferrari red (PR254) 

quin magenta (PR122)

quin purple (PV55) 

phthalo blue (PB15:0)