Making a Decision
There is nothing like having confidence when painting. In watercolor, changing your mind or fixing things up easily creates disaster. My photograph shows a wind break of Dark Green trees left of a field that add interesting shadows to the ripened soy bean field. I am thinking of using purple and yellow, but felt unsure of the balance so I made some color studies. Here is what I learned.
Strangely, the distant trees on the right are a warmer yellow green, and on the horizon they look light blue. Why? The sun is coming from the left. The closest trees on the left are all in shadow and the trees at the right of the corner of the field are in full sun.
Yellow and Violet dominate in this study. For composition, a big band of white clouds are added to break up the big empty sky space.
I like the rhythm of the shapes and color here. It feels precious to me, so I stopped and didn’t add the yellow field and shadows in the sketch. It is a good reminder to stop and let it dry when I get here and to work to get descriptive shapes over detail.
In this the tree, shadows were painted into the field before it dries, making the Gold field dull. Yellow & Violet are complimentary colors and bring each other out when put side by side, but dulled the field where they mixed. I will wait to add the detailed shadows into the field.
Starting on a full sheet of watercolor paper, a yellow and then red glaze were layered to keep it simple. I began working on the gold field using more analogous colors, oranges, yellows, greens and blues, to keep colors brighter before adding the shadows. This is not an easy painting so wish me luck. I hope to show you a finished piece when it is complete.
Sincerely,
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Monday, January 22nd | 2:00 PM – 4:00 PM CST Mon
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2024 “Paint the Desert” Plein Air Festival Exhibit
See my 3 paintings and many others beautiful plein air paintings of the Coachella Valley at the Artist’s Council beginning Today!
Artists Council in Palm Desert, 72567 Highway 111, Palm Desert, CA
January 18th – February 4th | 10am-4pm Thursdays-Sundays
The shown closes at 2:00 pm on the 4th.
The opening and awards is at 2pm on January 20th.
I have 3 watercolors in the show. Hope you can stop by!
More Details HERE!
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