Sun down, moon up... lachine canal

As the sun descended behind this tree, it appeared to burst forth out of the branches. It is an immensely difficult effect to create, and not the first time I have tried it. To start I applied the sun in the background using concentric rings of yellow, orange, pale red, pale cyan and blue. As it dried I applied the background trees and worked on filling in the foreground with a light and airy field of grass with shadows, and the edge of the Lachine canal with black fencing. Then came the hard part, the tree had to be over-painted using several variations, starting with a cool grey trunk, then multi-coloured branches of dark red, dark green and black. Meanwhile the brush texturing and detailing needed to disintegrate into the intense core of the sun. The illusion is quite complete, it seems almost the same as what it looked like. The neat thing is that a camera could never take this picture, but a person can make a painting. I honestly felt so rotten after work, I didn't think I would paint anything good today, but instead the location, the quiet, the sunset, somehow resulted in some classics like the reflection of the gantry crane, and this painting of the setting sun through tree.

Setting sun through tree, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, September 2024 (No. 4051)

 

After painting 'Setting sun through tree' and 'gantry crane reflection' I felt somewhat vindicated and decided to goof around for this one. The highway is on an extreme angle, the sun is like a beach ball, and the cars are ambiguous marshmallows with yellow hats. I kind of wanted to make the point that these cars are all going along like robots, all the while an incredible sunset is unfolding in the background.

Sunset over cars, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, September 2024 (No. 4052a)

 

Lastly, I captured this scene of the moon rising over the canal, with its reflection below. Because of perspective, the moon was over top of the telephone in the sky, but it was around the middle of the telephone pole in the reflection. It would take some trigonometry to understand that one, so I just painted what I saw. the sky and water were embellished significantly to create more drama in the painting. If you compose an element cutting straight across the middle, there needs to be enough visual interest in the elements to carry the scene. Well it was kind of fun but the mosquitos were starting to get to me and I headed home.

Moon rising over canal, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, September 2024 (No. 4052b)

Lachine canal reflections, sunset

The bike ride down here in rush hour is something else, a lot of noise and vehicle pollution. By the time I was done painting, I felt calmer and the long week of paperwork, teaching and meetings seemed a little farther away. This scene of the gantry crane reflecting in the canal while the sun was setting seemed impossible to paint and I kept riding over the foot bridge, but no sooner had the thought entered my mind than I slammed the brakes and turned around. The composition used a triangle format in the top left where the canal walls, foliage and base of the crane appears. The remaining 4/5 of the painting shows the surface of the canal reflecting the crane and the sunset. I painted the reflection by applying a 5 part HSV blend... hue saturation chroma is what it stands for, essentially it means that I vary the lightness, colour, and the intensity from a brownish blue, to blue, neutral cyan, orange and red-orange. When it dried I could paint over the multi-coloured ripples and the squiggly, broken reflection.
 

Gantry crane reflection in canal, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, September 2024 (No. 4050a)

 

Looking west to the overpass, the sky was a coral salmon colour under the bridge, fading to neutral cyan in the upper sky. Trees next to the path cast out rows of shadows. The canal was painted with an economy of brush strokes so that every component in the painting could fit together in harmony. It was so quiet here, just a distant murmur of cars.

Canal overpass with sunset, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, September 2024 (No. 4047b)

 

This was the first painting I did on the location, you can see a faint impression of my shadow standing next to the bike in the foreground. As the geese ate the grass, one of them was always standing upright with its head up. I got the impression that it was staring at me in particular, in case I was danger... or in case I started throwing food out. They look like majestic birds which is true, but they also produce large volumes of excrement. You have to watch where you step around here!

Geese near canal, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, September 2024 (No. 4050b)

Campus Indigenous Statue

There is a prominent statue on campus that I paint from time to time. Not being a figure painter, its a chance to practice while the figure stays still as a statue. The indigenous man is wearing some type of crown and is making an offering or welcoming gesture with a fabric or beaded object in his hand. A yellow ochre cloak sits on an earthy red skirt decorated with ornamental green and gold. To paint figures on location requires speed, a person walking will only be in view for a couple of seconds. The rest of this scene shows one of the paths through campus, and the marble benches surrounding the statue. I rearranged some of the background elements so as to mesh well with the figure element, for example, the building on the left was overlapping the head, which created an awkward arrangement. The revised view gives the sense of the figure looming over the landscape, stepping into it.

Campus indigenous statue, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, September 2024 (No. 4049a)

Painting when you can, where you can

With the days getting shorter and shorter it reduces the amount of sunlight after work when I tend to make paintings during the week, if not on lunch break. With endless paperwork and meetings it was another long day in the office, but afterwards I got as far as the Decarie overpass on the Maisonneuve bike path as the sun descended. Just before the sunset, the bright yellow sun had an orange disk of light around it which gave way to neutral cyan and blue. In the foreground is an autoshop with parked cars. Its not the first time I have painted on this location, it does tend to be the last area of NDG to catch sun.

Sunset over Decarie with autoshop, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, September 2024 (No. 4047a)

 

And here is the scene looking straight up the Decarie, on the right side is the rising off ramp that connects to Sherbrooke street. To paint the rows of packed cars bumper to bumper I created an angled grid of grey paint leaving the spaces free where the head and tail lights would go. After drying, I outlined the cars in rough blobs, dabbed in tires and shadows and finished with red tail tail lights, yellow (with a touch of white showing) headlights, and the blue-green windshields. I brought pyrol red back onto the palette, actually a blend of PR254 and PY97 called cadmium red hue by Daniel Smith company that is quite bright like a ferrari. Its ideal for tail lights. Its such a well crafted painting that it practically send shudders up my spine thinking about that Decarie traffic jam. It actually was moving well, since it was close to 7pm, so the painting might be a bit of an exaggeration!

Sundown rush hour, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, September 2024 (No. 4048a)

Trees around town as colour change begins

As fall approaches so do the colours start to change, albeit subtly. This tree on campus was darker and had an orange tint, captured with various blends of dark green (PBk31), green (PG36), yellow (PY97) and orange-yellow (PY110). The shadow elements at the bottom contain black (PBk6) and dark red (PR179). The trick here was recognizing the value of the leaves, a dark grey, as compared to the sky which is a light grey. Getting the brushwork was essential too, the bottom of the tree needed some bright leaves, and the top of the tree needed some dark leaves. I wonder if this is the most realistic looking tree I have ever painted? 

Dark green tree on campus, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, September 2024 (No.4046a)

 

The city has gone around town digging up the sidewalk and installing rectangular planters where plants, flowers or trees grow. Here is a pine tree, looking kind of lonely surrounded by concrete but still standing strong. It was even making pine cones in hope of producing new trees around it, since trees are supposed to be a part of a forest. I embellished the height of the tree considerably, as if five years in the future, in order to have its shape stand out from an incredibly busy background. It was like painting a miniature forest in the middle of a bustling city.

Pine tree standing strong, watercolour 6 x 7.5" cold press, September 2024 (No.4046b)

 

 

Crabapple countours, high spy, and rusticle surprise

With all of the painting lately, it was about time for some palette cleansers where I clean the palette literally and proverbially. On location I usually stick to the colours of the scenery which tend to be green, green, brown and blue. The rarest colours on location are red, magenta, and violet. For about a month now I had quinacridone cherry red (PR209) on the palette but it was not working well enough so I have gone back to pyrol red. In fact the paint I have now is called cadmium red hue, which is a mix of pyrol red (PR254) and nickel titanate yellow (PY53). Despite the name there is no cadmium in it which is toxic, this is a replacement formula that closely matches the original cadmium red paint.

Crabapple contours, watercolour 9 x 12" watercolour paper, September 2024 (No. 3885a)

 

Brilliant red, yellow, orange and magenta shapes are broken up by a black and white pattern cutting across the diagonal. An organic eyeball seems to float in space. There is a game called eye spy where one person picks a colour and the other tries to guess where it is. Looking at this painting it seemed to be a high spy.

High Spy, watercolour 9 x 12" watercolour paper, September 2024 (No. 3885b)

 

Hearing about the titanic and how its disintegrating on the ocean floor I learned a new word, rusticle. Its like an icicle made of rust hence the clever name. The formation is created by iron bacteria that can dissolve and consume iron oxides this creating the drippy brownish shapes. The amount of iron oxide pigment in this painting seemed fitting. Van Gogh was known to eat his paint, maybe he got a rusticle surprise the next day?

Rusticle Surprise, watercolour 9 x 12" watercolour paper, September 2024 (No. 3886a)

World Inspired Landscapes: Paraguay

Deep in South America is Paraguay, a small country with lush jungles and massive waterfalls like you see in the painting. Knowing a lot of Brazilians, they think of Paraguay as the place where knockoffs come from, like fake handbags and the like, so they say if something seems fake that it must from Paraguay. To be fair I don't know anyone from Paraguay so maybe they would say the same thing of Brazil who knows. Like most of the countries in South America Paraguay was colonized by the Spanish and the local indigenous peoples were mostly converted to Catholicism. Since it is a landlocked country, the people and the economic activity surrounded the mighty rivers that cut through the jungles. Although not known for tourism, there are apparently wonderful lakeside beaches. The painting is a bit of an exaggeration, it depicts a waterfall that looks as if its running over top of a staircase, with some tall spindly palm trees in the distance. 

World Inspired Landscapes: Paraguay, watercolour 9 x 12" watercolour paper, September 2024 (No. 3886b)