Over the past few days I have put in some more time on this one, both in thought and in action, as I’ve tried to sort out some problems that are new to me, such as painting a palm tree. I ended up doing a bunch of loose swipes with my soft brush with viridian, Sennelier yellow light, and burnt umber for the leaves, and doing some wet varied mix of ultramarine and burnt umber for the trunk. I will come in later with some opaque for some highlights.
As an aside, there’s something pretty satisfying about mixing the Sennelier paints with the soft brushes, maybe a little more so than the Maimeri Blu. They rewet easily (important for me because I don’t like to take time setting up, so I squeeze things out in advance and let them dry in my palette), and go onto the palette very richly. I think a lot of the fun with watercolor is moving paint around on the palette. I am looking forward to swapping in some more Sennelier in the earth pigments as I use up the Maimeri Blu.
I was also happy to get some depth and architectural detail with the window to make this feel more real. Now I can think better about how to proceed. The roof will present another challenge, as I want to combat my urge to try to make it right. I’d prefer to handle it quickly and impressionistically. Some more thought needs to go into that. I don’t want to get to that rougher style because I failed at doing it cleanly. I want to get there deliberately. Then again, that may not be the right place for it, and I should try to get it clean so the foliage seems wilder. This is another painting of experiments for me.
Thanks for reading.
Corey Aber 