Painting The City At Swinton’s

Last weekend I taught an in-person workshop at Swinton’s Art Supplies in Calgary.  It was a fabulous weekend.  The participants were an excellent group, very enthusiastic and very friendly.  Quite unusually there were many watercolour beginners in the group.  That turned out to be an advantage because we were able to proceed at a very appropriate pace.  Here are some photos of the class at work.

 

First Painting: Piazza del Popolo

This is an excellent subject because it teaches so many valuable lessons such as how to create a luminous wash, how to paint all types of figures as well as the often unrecognized idea of ‘eye level’.  Whenever we paint a group of people basically all the eyes need to be on the same line which we call eye level.

Here are an assortment of the particpants’ paintings.  They are all works in progress.

 

My Demo Paintings:  Piazza del Popolo

Here are the 2 paintings I did.  I’m including how the painting looked at the end of the workshop for reference and then the final version.

New York City Scene with Yellow Cabs

I made some significant changes to the composition.  When I got it home and looked at it I realized it needed the buildings to go back further down the road.  So I added a couple of extras and it helped.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Class Photo

Such a great group and such and enjoyable workshop.  It seems so odd but also so familiar to see all the masks.