Blog followers may remember this post from Paris, about a painting session on a very gray day. I was determined not to let the weather keep me from painting the cityscape of one of the most beautiful cities in the world. In fact, the gray weather is a hallmark of Paris, so I felt like I was seeing the city in its natural light. I was painting the Pont des Arts, the wonderful pedestrian bridge that crosses the Seine. (This is the bridge that has become the repository of millions of "lovers' locks", padlocks that seal the couples' love.)
I am often asked about my painting process, and whether I work on my plain air paintings once I am back home in my studio. The answer is sometimes yes, sometimes no. Here's an example of a painting that I put a few tiny touches on after returning home. The painting started out as you see below, a mere silhouette of the skyline, with the bridge in front of it.
At the conclusion of my plein air session, the painting stood as you see it in the top photo. I was pleased with the looseness of the painting, and the way it captured the subtle shifts in grays...one gray for the sky, a greener gray for the waters of the Seine. But I had been unable to catch a few fine points while I was on site...I thought the painting would benefit from a cleaner definition of the rail of the bridge, as well as from some indications of the people walking across the bridge. I also cleaned up a few spots in the sky where my brush had gotten dirty on site, and left the area a bit muddy. Here is the final result.
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| "Pont des Arts" 7 x 14 Oil on Canvas (c) Lesley Powell 2013 |
Stay tuned for a future post about a painting that I didn't touch one iota after coming in from the field...
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