Wednesday, September 05, 2018

Poolbeg - how to recover a bad sky

This painting was a disaster to start with. I was using too many colours for the sky and it was a complete mess. So I let it dry, then I rewetted the whole page and used my magic watercolour eraser to remove as much as I could. There were still some pink streaks (rose of ultramarine?), but I felt I could do something with it. So I limited my palette (French ultramarine, Piemontite Genuine, Monte Amiata Natural Sienna, Transparent Red Oxide, I think). I kept my sky simple this time, and the rest was easy. Full disclosure: I did add touches of white gouache to the chimneys, and I had to widen the pier to balance the view better!
Yes, lots of cranes in Dublin these days. We might not be quite back to the Celtic tiger madness, but there is a lot of building activity around town! Mostly commercial, despite our huge lack of houses and apartments for people to live in.



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