After painting in an around Montreal intensely for the last four years, and periodically before that, I have visited and revisited most of the popular areas. What I am calling the south circuit goes from Ville st Henri to Ville st Pierre along the canal path, the access points are down steep inclines from atop the NDG plateau. In fact, the south circuit was once a lake that was drained to make the canal and the highway, along with the aforementioned neighborhoods. In the painting, you see the tree line in the background with the two apartment towers, they are up an Sherbrooke. This community garden is at the end of Harley street where I have done many painting of the field, the chairs in the field and the sun flowers. In this scene a fellow was watering the plants.
Community Garden Westhaven, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, May 2024
Whenever I paint ducks they wont sit still for ten seconds. These ones sat still for about twenty seconds. A few other cyclists stopped by, but instead of being scared away the ducks seemed to activate themselves and waddled towards the cyclists, and then to me, expecting handouts. To paint the water I applied a wet-in-wet two colour layer, then after it dried painted over with short transparent brush strokes in blue, brown, and blue-grey.
Mallards next to Lachine Canal, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, May 2024
Here is a scene that only Peter Darlington would want to paint. I am standing under the noisy highway underpass just south of Ville st Pierre, looking up towards the westbound on ramp. I've rode past this a hundred times and always wanted to paint it, and yesterday was the moment. There is no formula for a painting like this, you just paint it. The main thing was to get that brilliant chartreuse coming through between the concrete structures, and the fade to brown polluted dirt towards the bottom near the road.
Highway Underpass Ville st Pierre, watercolour 5 x 7" cold press, May 2024
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