View from the Top

 

Just before the faculty meeting started I had a bit of time to make this painting from floor 8 of the John Molson Building downtown. The view out the window had the mountain in the background and many of the tall sky scrapers. Looking the people were like ants and the cars like toys. I had to paint fast since the meeting was about to start. Its not too often I paint from indoors, but I am glad I took the opportunity since it rained most of the afternoon.

View from the Top, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3534b)

Farewell Québec City for now!

 

On the last day of the trip I took a walk around the train station with my luggage in tow and paints at the ready. There was a wonderful view of the city from across a bay, it looked as if all the building were piled up on each other. One house stood out from the others, it had a red roof and was on a slightly different angle which I exaggerated to make it stand out in the painting. The Château Frontenac sat majestically atop the scene, set in among a myriad of spires and domes. I took a vastly simplified approach to the buildings and their many windows. A neutral grey was first applied, then brick colours were painted around the window shapes, followed by a brief brush stroke for each window.

Château Frontenac atop the city, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3532b)

 

The wind was blowing steadily which created interesting ripples on the water surface. I liked how the composition only shows part of the actual building, but significantly more of it reflecting on the water. At the left are the noses of several of the motor-cruise style boats. Reflecting on the Québec City trip as a whole I was quite pleased with the new people I met and new things learned from the conference, and the quality of the paintings was fantastic, a lot of people have checked out the blog more than usual which is great to see as an artist. There will definitely be more in the future although typically I find it harder to paint a lot in September and October as the grants are due and the classes begin at the University. I've never made excuses after all these years, I just keep on painting!

Marina with building reflection, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3533)

River Scenes around Québec City

For this painting I was standing up on the citadel embankments in Québec City looking down on the walking path and river in the background. A prominent tree tied together the composition. There were a lot of tourists around, one group even made a video of me doing the painting! On the left I depicted some of the old fashioned houses that line the street. I was impressed with how well kept up the old building were in Québec City, the facades, windows and roofs all looked like new even if they were hundreds of years old.

River Vista with Tree, watercolour 8 x 10" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3626)

 

Sailboats were out on the river, the people were enjoying the good weather and steady breeze. With a partly cloudy forecast, the lighting conditions were shifting from light to shadow periodically. This painting captures more of a light effect, with strong foreground elements to provide a sense of perspective.

Sailboats in River light, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3531a)

 

This is the same scene looking out over the river but it depicts a more shadowed scene where the sails are lighter than the surrounding water. The water was a bluish-brown with orange highlights, and a few sparkles from the water ripples. I captured more of the background elements in this version, and made sure to make a nice sapphire-blue horizon line to signify the vast distances. 

Sailboats in River shadow, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3531b)

Flowers and Bus, NDG

Yesterday, I was riding back from Westminster street after buying some local produce including 10 cloves of garlic, when I arrived at a street corner planted with great big bunches of pink, magenta, and white flowers. A city bus was parked silently in the background, but soon after I started the painting it took off and I had to complete the scene from memory. I had to simplify their petal shapes into amorphous blobs in order to get the painting done. I liked the contrast between the delicate flowers (pink and chartreuse) with the rough looking bus (dark and angular). I don't know the name of these flowers, I will have to take a picture and use google image search. Note: After taking a picture of these flowers and image searching, these are called cosmos flowers. 

Flowers and Bus, NDG, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3535b)

Cafe Restaurant, Public Square Québec City

 

In the old City there are many restaurants open in the high season. This one was bustling with activity in the late evening when I made the painting under a lamp with strong white light ( I did not have my head lamp with me this time). It took up to an hour to complete this one due to all the detail, and a few conference goers recognized me and we chatted awhile. When doing paintings like these you have to envision the finished product and be patient as the illusion completes. The blank white paper makes it look add, but once the areas fill in, the light highlights, which are just the paper showing, create the impression of artificial light. Most the light came from four large floodlights on the facade, while the restaurant itself had dozens of smaller lights.

Cafe Restaurant at Night, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3530a)

 

Done obviously during the day, this painting shows a public square with fountains where kids were playing. It was a daunting painting to tackle, but I was sitting under the only shade that I could find in the area and it seemed a rather nice cool place to stay awhile. Every now and then some cool mist would waft over from the fountains. The painting really needed to be on a bigger piece of paper to catch all the details, and the building all look a little tilted, but I enjoy the memory and you can get the sense of kids playing in a fountain on a hot day in Québec City. There are still about half a dozen paintings left to post, it was more productive than I thought, both scientifically and artistically.

Public Square with Fountains, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3530b)

More Night Paintings from Québec City

Since the conference ran from 8AM to 5PM, and there were some social things lined up, I used the remaining time to make night paintings around town. It was cool and pleasant and generally felt like a safe place to be all things considered. After the monumental painting of the Château, I felt pretty confident to try some more paintings at night. This scene is right in the heart of the old City, there was an entertainer singing folk songs and a group of people dancing up a storm. I studied the scene for some time, wanting to include the people singing and dancing, but settled for a less ambitious design of the illuminated building and surrounding environment. To give the illusion of night and artificial light, I played up the contrasts between the inky blue sky (PB60 with PBk6 and PO36), and the warm variations of orange-yellow and yellow of the plaster facade. It all looked rather weak until I added the dark green window frames and lamp details, then it popped. This one reminds me a bit of Van Gogh's famous night cafe painting, which I had in mind as I painted.  

Singing and Dancing Corner, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3527)

Going straight from a dinner to paint, I did not have my head lamp for this one, instead relying on the amber lights. I knew from experience that yellow and orange tend to look grey under an amber light making it hard to judge chroma, and blue also gets neutralized. I like the finished product, it almost seems like the street is illuminated by old candle or kerosene lamps.With a curve in the road like this, which I spotted on one of my daytime walks, the composition was a guaranteed hit.

Illuminated Street, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3528b)

Exhausted from a long day, I managed one last painting on this night, I had my head lamp this time. It shows the old wall, textured and eroded, with a brightly illuminated turret and a few stars. A hydrant and walking path carry the foreground. There are several light sources from my left and right which cast an eerie glow on the scene.

Old Wall and Turret, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3529)

The Château Frontenac at night

Without any hesitation I marched down to The Château Frontenac at night with my shoulder bag and headlamp ready. Knowing that this would be a long paint time, I found a bench facing the classic hotel and settled in for the effort. After a long day at the conference it was a pleasure to sit there on a cool evening in relative silence. Well, there was a street show going on, and a gaggle of tourists at all times but it didn't bother me. Before leaving for Québec City I wanted to paint the Château again since I have made attempts on the last few trips such as here. Painting it at night just added to the challenge. To start the painting I made a fairly detailed outline in grey paint making sure to get all the roof angles correct, and the verticals straight. I simplified some of the brick work  and ornate details to make the painting feasible. Even so, it was probably about 1.5 hours of painting which is a lot more than usual, on par with the Sugar Shack painting from 2021.Since I didn't have pyrol orange I used dark blue (PB60) with benzi orange (PO36) for the sky and a touch of carbon black along the top. The greens were done with perylene green (PBk31) and touches of phthalo green (PG7) and dark blue. To paint the facade, I applied grey, and overlaid with neutral brick orange. They key to this paining were the value contrasts. The roof at the top was darker than the sky, and the bricks were illuminated from below. The very top of the building had purplish flood lights, which I depicted with tints of magenta (PR122) and blue (PB15). Finally, I filled in the windows with bright yellow in various tints, and added details like the brick patterns and window frames. It was a painting that gradually looked better with each painting step, I just had to trust the processes. A lot of tourists came over when the street show ended, I was the most photographed painter of the night!

The Château Frontenac at night, watercolour 8 x 10" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3624)

Québec City Sunset

The hotel was located just off the main commercial street, Grand Allée which provided the occasional view north towards the setting sun. I caught this view while walking to the old City and stopped immediately to make a painting before it got completely dark. The key to this painting was mixing the sky colours correctly. The horizon was a pale orange, like a creamsicle colour, which changed to a neutral grey, followed by pale cyan, and capped with a salmon coloured cloud with purplish shadow. The tree line was a purplish green. Upon completion, the painting effect closely matched the actual scene. Adding all the heavy brick and concrete tones in the foreground, and suggesting reflections on the parked cars completed the illusion. After this painting I painted a monumental night scene of the  Château Frontenac for which I will make a separate post.

Québec City Sunset, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3525b)

 

 

Soggy Saturday Ride to Canal

The ride started off with a slight drizzle which developed into a downpour by the time I reached the Maisonneuve bike path. Standing under a tree next to my bike, with my umbrella, I managed to make a painting of the flowers growing next to the bike path and the pedestrian/bike overpass that goes over the train tracks. It was full on raining but somehow I managed to hold the palette, paper, umbrella with my left hand although I spilled a bunch of paint on my shirt. The painting turned out better than I thought. You can see the overpass structure behind all the trees, and the ramp off to the left which leads up and around.

Flowers near pedestrian overpass, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3534a)

The st Armand paper makers are an old couple who have been hand crafting art paper for decades. Recently there was an article saying that the rent had gone up too much and they were leaving their Montreal location to go somewhere cheaper. It turns out that they are still at their Montreal location down by the Lachine canal at least for now. This painting shows their store, which is actually just the yellow door on the basement floor, you can see the top half of the door, accessible by a descending staircase, and a small sandwich board. No wonder I never noticed this store before, I would have gone earlier!

La papeterie Saint-Armand, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3535a)

On the way back I saw this and stopped my bike immediately. Every now and then, that happens, where a spectacular scene emerges out of nowhere that  has to be painted. The structure is that famous old granary/malt building that is long since defunct. Some street artists painted the small house-like buildings pink about 5 years ago, and I have been painting it ever since. The clouds were the main subject matter here, I used various wet-in-wet techniques, and paint lifting to create the sun beam effect. A sliver of the Lachine Canal is at the bottom of the painting. For some reason I forgot to initial this one, I will do so at the next opportunity.

Sunbeams on Pink House, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3536a)

Québec City Conference Center

 

The Québec City conference center was a non de-scrip box of glass surrounded by a highway and a sitting area with flower installations. The City really does love its flowers! I made this one on a lunch break, you can see the conference center in the background, and the colourful display of flowers and flowering shrubs in the foreground. Painting a scene without a sky is actually a bit challenging, so I made sure to reflect some blue in the background glass panels and keep the flower display high chroma so you know it was a bright sunny day. 

Flowers outside of Conference Center, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3526a)

 

On another lunch break I walked over to the park area surrounding the old fortification wall and got a view of the conference center nestled between the hotels and buildings. Everywhere you looked there were plenty of these landscape installations, but little actual nature to behold. As a landscape painter in the city I look for elements of nature, but in this case the fake nature was decent enough.

Conference Center City View, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023

 

Before I did the larger sized painting of the garden flowers, I made a smaller study. This was from the opposite angle and I put more detail into the statue which is partially shown. I didn't feature the statue, just suggested it, otherwise it would end up looking like a tourist photo. To make the grass appear to be highly illuminated by he sun, I  surrounded the lawn with darker elements and made the shadows in the foreground extra dark and purple. You may think the grass is green, but it is chartreuse. In fact, I varied the lawn with two shades of chartreuse, a yellow, and a green tint.

Flower Garden Study, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023

Painting in Québec City

 

Painting in Québec City was quite a lot of fun, this scene is looking north along rue d'Auteuil which runs parallel to the old fortress walls (off to the left but not seen in this painting). The view was surprisingly clear, it gave a wonderful sight line to the sloping emerald coloured mountains on the horizon reminiscent of a van Gogh painting. The houses seemed to cling to the steep, undulating streets in the old city of Québec built up over 400 years ago. Building facades were a mix of old stone, plaster, and red brick. I noticed a lot of trees and planted flowers around the city, it was very well decorated and clean. I did this painting on the first day, walking from the train station to the hotel, luggage in tow. None of the tourists walking by seemed to notice this fantastic view until they saw me painting it, then on occasion they would stop and take a picture of the view, or me! With strong sun I took a lot of heat during the painting but glad I hung in there, it really captures the look and feel of this charming old city. 

View north along rue d'Auteuil, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3525a)

Back from Québec City

I got back from the 5 day conference in Québec City and scanned one of the last paintings I completed on the trip. It shows part of a large flower garden on the Plaines d'Abraham, just down the street from the hotel le Concorde. The flowers in the foreground were in shadow, which I depicted with a purplish grey underpainting followed by colourful details. The mid and back grounds were very bright due to the strong sun. Quite a few people walked by and took a look as I painted, that was common due to all the tourists. I will scan and blog about the other paintings I did on the trip, about a dozen or so. And yes I attended the conference regularly, meeting other scientists and new people, and learning a lot of new things. Okay, I may have snuck out now and then to make a painting, but my supervisor was okay with that. I'm the supervisor!

Flower Garden on Plaines, watercolour 8 x 10" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3623)

Outdoor Market Rainy Day

Riding back from Mount Royal was all downhill through the cold rain and wind. Needless to say it was miserable to ride in that weather so I stopped in one of the seasonal installations the city puts in some neighborhoods. It consists of some benches, flowers, and a roof which great to dry out a bit. I had a view of the open market on the corner of Cote des Neiges and Jean Brilliant. I knew in theory that a painting like this was possible, but was not so sure in practice. I made the entire grey background first, leaving the umbrellas and the market's interior blank. Working up the details, I finally closed it with the figures and the colourful fruit under the artificial lights. Finally I took the plunge and painted diagonal rain lines across the scene, inspired by Hiroshige. Tomorrow I head off to Quebec City for a conference, and plan to do some painting too. Last time I painted there was 2019, so it will be interesting to paint there again after doing a lot of paintings in the last three years. 

Outdoor Market Rainy Day, watercolour 8 x 10" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3621b)

Soggy Day on Mount Royal

 

The ride up to Mount Royal went well enough but the rain picked up, or rather came down, as I rode through the winding paths. I stopped under a tree and made a painting of the puddle in the path, and a garbage bin next to another big tree. The grass had an eerie green glow in the wet forest. With all the moisture the paint was turning to a liquidy paste on my palette making it quite the mess. The rain finally subsided slightly.

Puddle on the Path, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3515b)

I hoped to find some shelter at the large chalet building next to Beaver Lake but the building was surrounded by a construction fence. I found yet another large tree to stand under and make this painting of the lake and some gulls standing around. To paint the gulls I had to paint around their forms, then daub in some light grey and dark grey. The water was a variety of colours, which seemed to blend into more grey. You could say that it was a grey day. I wonder if their used to be beavers here and they made a lake? Nowadays it is highly developed with marble edges and luxurious sidewalks going all around it. To the right is the steep slope that becomes a toboggan hill in the winter.

Gulls near Beaver Lake, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3516)

Evening Ride to Canal, Sunset Greens

Making my way down to the canal after work only took about 10 minutes by bike thanks to the St. Jacques overpass they opened a few years ago. The canal bike path forks here, leading to a bridge that goes over the canal (foreground), or onward to downtown (right). The sun was low on the horizon and quite strong, creating a patchwork of shadows over top of the winding bike path. In the background, wispy grass was glowing in the light. It was a tricky painting to manage but the overall effect is nice. Just imagine the strong wind gusting and people riding by all the time. 

Fork in Bike Path, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3509b)

This was the first painting I did on the short excursion, it shows a walking path that runs parallel to the canal, and alternating light and shadows on the green grass. I vary the greens by mixing four colours: perylene green (PBk31), phthalo green yellow shade (PG36), yellow (PY154 or PY97) and iso yellow (PY110) and adjusting the amount of water. I also varied the colour of the blades of grass to match the underpainting, and made the railing orange where the light was falling.

Light on Shadow on Grass, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3508b)

On the way back I tackled a panorama scene of downtown Montreal with part of the highway, and large clouds overhead. Paining clouds can be extremely difficult to do since their colour, value, and saturation changes seamlessly. Too much water and the clouds diffuse, not enough water and the edges are hard. In this attempt I added paint in quick succession to get a wet-in-wet-in-wet technique. With strong wind the paint dries really fast which had to be taken into account.

Big Clouds over Montreal, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3510)

Memories of Toledo, Spain

Toledo is a small city close to the center of Spain, it is built upon a prominent dome-shaped mountain with a valley and a surrounding river. It's a popular tourist destination due to the historic buildings, cobblestone streets, and the McDonalds at town center. Okay, one of those things is not really why tourists go there, cobblestone streets are not for everyone. I stayed at a youth hostel located in an old castle, and made this painting of the window looking out onto the impressive landscape and old fortifications. They must have really wanted to protect that McDonalds restaurant because there sure were a lot of defensive castles and walls built! More interesting is the foreground, which shows the turret-like window, and my laundry drying. I like the blue reflection in the front tiles, and my drying socks on the ledge.
 

Window View, watercolour 5 x 8" cold press, 1998 (No. 0868)

Out and about I found incredible views around Toledo, this one was done from the north side of town looking out onto the country side. This painting is quite excellent because the sides are roughly straight, the gradation in the sky is perfect, there is a wide variety of greens and olives, and the foreground flowers have a lot of detail especially the fuzzy white ones glowing in the hot Toledo sun.

North Side view, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, 1998 (No. 0869)

 

Going down to the river in the valley, it was a lot cooler than up in the city. I made a few paintings from this vantage point, this one frames some of the stonework around the shimmering river and mountainous background. Toledo was great for painting, it had a blend of country with city, and all kinds of interesting angles. I had a bad habit of tapering the painting on the right like you see here and in several of the Spain paintings, the bottom is narrower than the top creating a leaning scene. It is not something that I noticed until later. Part of the explanation is that I used to always paint while sitting down, with the paper sitting flat on my lap. Doing that created a perspective illusion; the painting looked fine when viewed at an angle, but it looked crooked when viewed perpendicular. Or maybe I was just hung over. At any rate, I enjoy looking at the old Spain paintings, and still consider this to be a pivotal experience in my long artistic journey. 

South River view, watercolour 5 x 8" cold press, 1998 (No. 0871)

Sunflower Sunset

 

Just across the street from the bus stop there is a grocery store that has community garden-pots all around the parking lot. Local enthusiasts planted a variety of flowers and herbs, including several prominent sunflowers that tend to bloom in late August. This evening I set out after to work to capture the sunset after rethinking a painting strategy for the complex mix of colours. From bottom to top, the sunset transitioned from high chroma (saturated) red-orange, orange, orange-yellow, then a series of low chroma (greyish) colours including yellow, green, cyan, finishing with increasing intensity of blue to the top of the sky. Its hard to write and even harder to paint but now that I understand it better I can figure out the proper way to mix it. The sunflower attracted me like a moth to a candle flame. As I stood painting this scene many people glanced over and commented. Look, a nice painting! Getting the yellow of the sunflower right was tricky, it was a slightly warm yellow, with medium value... slightly darker then the sunset, but lighter than the surrounding foliage. All of the colours are slightly exaggerated here to pay homage to the style of, well, you can probably guess what artist inspired me to paint sunflowers!

Sunflower Sunset, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3515a)

This was the first painting I did on location, the scene shows the parking lot with all its surrounding greenery and the sunflowers growing in a large wooden planter. I made a similar painting in 2021 of the same parking lot with sunflowers. As I researched methods to paint sunsets I discovered a painting by Monet known as Sunset in Venice, you can see it on wikipedia by clicking the link. Monet created the sunset with small interlocking brushstrokes that went from red orange, orange, orange-yellow, then a low chroma (greyish) yellow, followed by high chroma green, cyan and blue to the top. He tried to grey-out the green too, which fits the profile that I measured using digital analysis of sunset photos. That goes to show how keen Monet's eye was.. without the benefit of computers or cameras he was able to match almost exactly what could be expected in a sunset. Even more impressive is that it took Monet many hours to complete a painting, but a sunset only lasts ten or twenty minutes. It must have been a great challenge for him, perhaps he returned to the scene several nights in a row as he did for many of his landscapes. Upon further reading it seems that Monet may have finished those Venice paintings in his studio.

Sunset Metro Parking Lot, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3514b)

Auto Shop Night Grey

Just the other day I was thinking about doing another painting of the auto shop across the street, and so I sat down out on the garden ledge and did one this evening. Lately, my condo updated the exterior lighting which transformed the previous situation (no working light) to what it is now, a blazing bright LED floodlight. It was so bright that I could sit out in front of the condo and make a night painting without using the headlamp. The nice thing about LED lighting is that it projects a broad spectrum which makes the colour accuracy easier to achieve as compared to painting under an amber light where everything appears to be yellow and grey. I was hoping to make a night painting of the local sunflowers but they still have not bloomed properly after a slow start to the growing season. Getting back to the painting of today, I embellished some of the light/shadow elements to recreate the ethereal glow of the auto shop flood lights illuminating the car, nearby building, ground and sidewalk. Since they (Joe and Ralph I presume) painted the building grey it is a lot less interesting. To compare, you can look at a 2021 painting when the walls were dark red, also known as maroon. Looking at that older painting of a similar subject, I also see how far I have come along as a painter in the past few years. The 2021 painting has a lot of energy and the lamp seems to be blazing, but the detail was lacking. The current painting depicts a calm atmosphere with a subtle greenish cast across the scene, and crisp details throughout the scene.

Auto Shop Night Grey, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3514a)

Creative Budget

 

To create a painting like this, I start with one decisive line, in this case the yellow-orange crescent shape that is wound up in the blue violet rope. The rest of the painting followed the form of the initial element. I dropped some water on top of the painting by accident, which suddenly made it look like clouds, and so I went with the blue and white background to give it a light and airy feeling. Another theme was to juxtapose like colours, for example brown next to red, dark yellow next to light yellow, and blue next to green. To name this painting I was thinking about the laboratory budget, but also the budget of ideas. We know roughly how much money we have in an account, but do we know how many creative ideas we have left?

Creative Budget, watercolour 9 x 12" watercolour paper, August 2023 (No. 3643a)

Ride North to the Mythical Bois-Franc

 

Looking north on Devonshire Road in the industrial park there was a surprising amount of greenery. I have to give the industrial park designers some credit, they incorporated trees, landscaping, expanses of grass and some really interesting architectural elements in the buildings. And on the weekend it is very quiet here and not many people are around. Off in the distance is autoroute 40 running west-east. The hardest part of this painting was actually the road itself. To capture the faded asphalt I mixed dark blue (PB60) with purple magenta (PV55) and some brown (greenish umber PBr7), there is a subtle adjustment from warm to cool as it recedes to the distance. The composition really shows the desolate, open landscape that probably used to be farmland.

Industrial Park Devonshire Road, watercolour 8 x 10" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3627)

The main attraction for a cyclist on Devonshire is to go under the autoroute at the underpass that goes over the train tracks. You can easily miss the bike route, the first time I looked all around to find the spot to cross. In this view, I am looking east along the elevated highway where it dips down. As I got into this painting I realized it was harder than I thought, the perspective and 3-D structure of the underside of the road with its supports and the on ramp behind it made for a tricky paint. The wind was really whipping up the paper and palette making it even harder! I got some paint spatters on my UV protection shirt.

Autoroute 40 near underpass, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3513a)

The few times I have made it up to Bois-Franc I looked for the mythical Bois-Franc (Hardwoods Forest) and could not find it. Today I got to the name sake, park Bois-Franc only to find several long acres of landscaped and bricked-over ground, decorative plants, manicured trees and flowers enclosed in pots. It wasn't much of a forest, although there was a long wetlands pond with ducks and reeds. Depressed at what I had found, I rode westward along a street that may have been named Ernest-Hemingway avenue or close to it. Finally, I saw some dense forest surrounded by wildflowers, and just stopped randomly to make a painting of it for posterity. We will call this the Bois-Franc painting so I never have to go back there again! At least the bike paths were good once I got into the neighborhood. 

The Mythical Bois-Franc, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3513b)

Ride to river, light rain

At the end of the large park next to Lachine there are good views West along the river, with a prominent red capped lighthouse that would be rights around Stony point park. A few sailboats were out, and a family was fishing in the river. Over the years I have noticed that the water colour of the st Lawrence is a burgundy brownish tint when seen at an angle or in shallows. I made the colour with quin purple (PV55), dark blue (PB60), and red ochre (PR101/PBr7). It started to rain lightly and I had to finish the details quickly.  

View of Lighthouse in Lachine, watercolour 8 x 10" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3620a)

Every year this tree leans a little more, you can see in this painting where it has broken through the concrete retaining wall. One day it will probably topple into the river but for now it seems to be making plenty of leaves and doing fine despite its angle. The main focal point was actually the fast flowing water. It had little white bubbles here and there with a strong undercurrent. In the foreground, there were clover flowers all over the grass.

Leaning tree flowing water, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3511)

On the weekend paint trips I have more time to make these paintings, hence the great amounts of detail as compared to some of my weekday paintings which are done on lunch break or after work. It did not feel like a lot of work this one, despite the large number of brush strokes needed to create the lush shrubbery and wild flowers. In contrast, the bridge and background were done with an economy of brush strokes. It's hard to believe that this is the same landscape that I painted in the winter when everything was covered in sheets of white and devoid of life save for the conifer trees. The bridge I believe, is the st Laurent railway bridge which is in front of the Mercier bridge when looking East.

Shrubs, Flowers, view of Railway bridge, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3512)

Windy Day on Campus

 

It was a windy day on campus today, with mixed sun and cloud. I found a place to sit under a tree at a picnic table but the wind still kept blowing the paper around as I painted. You can see the main admin building in the background along Sherbrooke street, with the path that leads to the Perform Centre which is behind me. The tree is an oak tree that grows tall and pointy and makes a lot of acorns this time of year which attracts the squirrels. To mix the green roof colour I combined PG36 phthalo green with dark blue (PB60) and some water. The other greens were all mixed of yellow (PY154) with indo (PY110) and phthalo green yellow shade (PG36). For certain things now I use the same combos since it seems to be the best.

Windy Day on Campus, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3502b)

Scenes South of Train Tracks

This scene looks a little different than last time I painted it when the roof was a rich brick red colour. Now it is a brilliant blue, which I could match with phthalo blue (PB15) and a touch of indo blue (PB60). The main inspiration for the painting were the wild flowers growing in the parking lot, they were a mix of Queen Anne's lace with some kind of butter cup plant. I omitted all the cars to focus on the building and the flowers. This is the first scan with my new Canon scanner, I got the basic model called LiDe 400for a good deal at Bureau en Gros, they even delivered it for free.
 

Renaissance blue roof with flowers, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3506b)

The main reason I got out of the office today was to drop off some donations from my office at the Renaissance. Usually on a work week I am satisfied with one painting, but on the way back there was some amazing drums being played inside of the Caribbean cultural center, at the same time I saw this neat combination of colours from the city bus and mail box in the foreground. As the drum beats echoed through Harley street I found a good visual rhythm. The bus took off pretty fast so I had to finish the details from memory.

Bus stop and mailbox, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3505b)

Highschool night scene

While on an evening walk in Bolton Cilei and I went past the highschool and saw an interesting sunset with the eerie lights from the highschool interior shining through slots in the door. The sunset was actually more of a yellow-orange-blue but it came out darker in the painting because I mixed orange on the horizon with dark blue on the top of the sky. The outline for this painting was made on location, but I filled it in recently on our kitchen table (my indoor studio). The actual colours of a sunset are rather complex to paint despite me trying over the years. After a bit of research and colour analysis from photos I see that a sunset is orange-red to orange to yellow at the base, and blue high in the sky. The hard part is what is in between the yellow and blue... its a gradation of desaturated (greyish) yellow, really desaturated chartreuse, green, cyan then to the blue. I'm not sure how to paint that exactly but next time there is a sunset I'll give it a try. One good example I did last year was sunset over Montreal seen between two bridges.

Highschool night scene, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3523b)

Invasive Spectrum

I read an article on invasive species (other than humans), and it turns out that a number of creepy looking slugs and snails are getting into the Northern parts of America. Many of them are poisonous and harbour parasites, not to mention can out compete the local critters. To start off this painting I was actually thinking of the large banana slugs that our family saw on a trip to the old growth forests in Vancouver many years ago. The colour scheme included a variety of blue, magenta and purple pastels with high chroma yellow and green elements. It looks harmonious even though there are variety of hues in the spectrum represented.  With two palettes on the go, mostly identical, I had a fair but of cleaning to do, so there is a second abstract I will hopefully post tomorrow.

Invasive Spectrum, watercolour 9 x 12" watercolour paper, August 2023 (No. 3642a)

Corn Fields Columbia Way,

Bolton is a sprawling suburban town north of Toronto that is surrounded by farmland. Just across Columbia way a vast cornfield goes as far as the eye can see. Housing developers would love to get their hands on this land, but so far a relative truce in the form of a green belt has kept them at bay. Speaking of green, with all the rain the corn was a very intense shade of green that was difficult to capture. I made an under-painting of green/chartreuse fading to the foreground to give a sort of artificial glow, then over laid it with a variety of green brush strokes to give it a palpable sense of movement.  

Corn Field horizontal, watercolour 8 x 10" cold press, July 2023 (No. 3621a)
 

This was the first attempt, where I worked out some of the colours and techniques that would lead to the larger version shown above. It struck me that impressionist painters, even van Gogh who painted corn fields on occasion did not produce such a bright green. Part of it is technology, the phthalocyanine green was only brought to market in the mid twentieth century. It comes in two shades, a blue shade and a yellow shade. The names are an exaggeration since they are both blue-leaning green hues, although the yellow version (PG36) is pretty close to a visually exact green. I mostly learned that from reading MacEvoy's Handprint.com.

Corn Field vertical, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, July 2023 (No. 3520b)

Painting Downtown Montreal

As we waited for the 420 bus last week I noticed a few good views along Robert-Bourassa near the train station. Today I rode back to the location and made a few paintings including this one looking south towards the Farine Five Roses buildings. The composition uses two buildings as a framing device, on the left is an enormous new skyscraper they recently completed, on the right is an old brown concrete building probably from the 1960's era. To paint the cars I used an economy of brush strokes including an inverted cup shape for the roof, a line for the back bumper, and three black marks for the shadow, then finished with a stroke of colour.
 

View down Robert-Bourassa Blvd, watercolour 8 x 10" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3629)

Cars were parked on a steep incline in front of an old style office block. These kinds of paintings are harder than they look because there is no sky line and little contrast to work with. A lot of people walked by and looked on as I worked. To mix beige colours I use a greenish umber (PBr7) neutralized with dark blue (PB60), and with a touch of orange (PO62) added if needed. Sometimes I mix yellow ochre (PY43) with dark blue for a really greenish or neutral grey.

View up Robert-Bourassa Blvd, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3524a)

The train station is located in Gare Central which is accessed by a dark low-hanging parking garage on rue de la Gauchetière. Aside from the navy-blue via rail sign, there was a colourful fast food chain sign which I changed to PJD 23. There was a lot going on in this painting and it took a fair bit of time due to the amount of detail and complex composition. Most of the scene was in shadow but a few surfaces caught the late morning light.

Gare Central, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, August 2023 (No. 3524b)