Pleasant walk along Decarie Blvd

It may have been a pleasant walk, before the Decarie highway was built this was a residential boulevard. The traffic must have been pretty intense though, which necessitated the construction of this highway which connects autoroute 40 to downtown and across to Verdun and beyond. It was a nice day at least, I got off to a late start and had to make due with what little time and opportunity there was to paint. This scene focuses on a yellow right turn sign, with a pedestrian bridge cutting across to the other side of the sunken highway. The glowing cloud effect is done with wet-in-wet technique where a dilute yellow mix is added to a semi-dry purplish mix to create a smooth backwash. One of my favorite paintings of the year, Cloud over Trenholme Park, used a similar technique to great effect.

Right turn Decarie Blvd, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, November 2024 (No. 4157b)

 

Next to the gas station there is a purplish building with a giant mural of a bulldog and a wide parking lot, seen in the painting. Actually I just decided to paint the trees and houses in the background and composed a bit of the warehouse on the right. Perhaps I can go back and paint the bulldog some time.

Back lot bulldog building, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, November 2024 (No. 4157a)

 

Without much to choose from, I did one last scene of these signs in and around the highway. A new car wash was on this corner, it looks like it used to be a car rental place or somethings. The green sign behind the trees is one of the highway signs that hangs over the decarie. Its kind of neat to see houses in the background, although it must be noisy and somewhat polluted to live so close to this highway.

Signs of the time, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, November 2024 (No. 4158a)