There is nothing that says spring in Montreal like new grass, budding leaves, trees with pink flowers, and construction pylons. Walking back from work I stopped at Trenholme park and made this small painting looking across Sherbrooke. The pylons were real although I embellished their size in the painting. To paint the pylons I outlined them with paint, did the background elements, then applied bright orange, a mix of benzi orange PO62 and pyrol red-orange PO73. When dry, I overlaid a grey wash on the sides of the cone to create the shadow and the grey element in the middle of the orange. After many years I have nearly perfected the art of painting pylons!
Another thing I tried was to apply the tree with pink leaves at home, using a paint called buff titanium. Buff titanium is a greyish white paint that is very opaque, enough so that it sits on top of the darker brick colours in the background. Then I applied daubs of pink (PR122) to give it colour. This approach would have worked better had I applied a white gauche paint, but I don't have any, and technically that's cheating in the watercolour world! If I ever do use gauche paint with watercolour, then I would label it is mixed media.
Symbols of Spring in Montreal, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, May 2023 (No. 3438b)
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