Fall Leaves and Shadows

Not far from where I was painting today is st Paul park, which is just to the west of the autoroute 15/20. The park was a large flat square with millions of leaves on the ground. Long, bluish shadows were being cast by all the trees. Most of the housing was typical of the area, the three-storey brick boxes with white widows, balconies, and spiraling black staircases. This painting was really about the leaves on the grass. I started with a yellow-orange glow (PY43 and PO72), then worked up the colours towards green and brown with short interlocking brush strokes. Finally I applied the blueish shadows (PB60) and dark highlights (PBk31, PR101, PBk6). One colour I don't write much about is magenta, I carry two on my palette, a dark magenta (PV19) and a bright magenta (PR122). Sometimes the colour appears in clothing, furniture and a sun-set on a humid day. Most of the time I use these colours to adjust grey and blue mixtures. For example, the tree and its shadow actually contain magenta to give it the tree bark appearance. This was a good place to sit on a bench and eat lunch. I was just surprised at the lack of squirrels here considering how many tall trees there were.

Fall Leaves and Shadows, watercolour 8 x 10" Strathmore Series 400, November 2022 (No. 3338a)