Riding up Senkus Avenue from the canal leads past an industrial area and several large shopping malls. Yesterday, I noticed several full-sized apples on the grass near the sidewalk and though at first someone had thrown a bag of apples out the window of their car. But then I noticed a gnarled old apple tree at the top of the steep hill, it still had apples on its branches. I took some of them home to feed the squirrels (they like the pits) and put them into the composter. Today I returned to the location and made a painting of the scene, complete with frozen apples resting on the hill side. Due to the winter conditions I have to put a considerable amount of salt in the water (20 grams of salt for 100mL of water) which prevents freezing, but also makes the paint dry very slowly. So I painted in the sky first with as little paint as possible, then worked on the grassy hillside while it dried. The sky had to dry in order to put the tree over top. The hill side and apples contain a variety of yellow, green, orange and red elements, which contrasts against the soot-brown tree. The apples on the branches were back-lit by the sky making them look maroon. A fellow on roller-skis was going up and down the road, and he stopped to chat with me for awhile about exercising in the cold and sketching.
Wild Apple Tree on Hill, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, December 2022 (No. 3343)
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