Watercolor - Siena, Italy

So here is the last in the Watercolor series. This is the one I am the most proud of and the one we have actually framed. For reference here are the first, second, and third in the series so you can see the progression.

Siena was a day trip from Florence. The city was picturesque, but did not have many must-see sites. So it was perfect for doing watercolor. Meeting before in the Piazza del Campo, seeing the cathedral, settling down to create a watercolor, then meeting up again in the Piazza.

From here, I will return to posting photos every Friday unless I find a sketch of interest.

Watercolor - Firenze, Italia

Here is a watercolor of the Ponte Vecchio in Firenze, Italia. One of my favorite cities in Europe including Vienna, Stockholm, and Paris. This one is a bit of a departure from the previous ones. I did a light pencil sketch to be sure of the proportions then used the color to define the edges. I also didn't close crop this image because I liked how the edges turned out.

Watercolor - Villefranche sur Mer, France

I'd be amiss if I continued with the Watercolor series without mentioning the person who taught it to me. Carl Johnson (the artist, not the Olympic athlete) was our guide on the watercolor sketch trip through the French Riviera and Tuscany. You may notice that much of my style mimics his. My better attempts were those of a permanent ink hand sketch with accented color filling in between.

Each day we would find ourselves in a different locale and he would give us tips on the environment. We would all disperse and proceed with searching out our subject and completing the painting. Afterward we would rendez-vous and he would critique our work. At night we would meet up for a good supper and numerous beverages. The thing that made the trip so special was not only learning watercolor, but the interesting conversations and the adventure of traveling together. He was one of us discovering the place and enjoying the moment.

We have kept in touch after all these years. He sends us a Christmas card every year and we visited him a few times in Galena, IL while we lived in Chicago. We happened to be in his studio on our first wedding anniversary and he gave us a print of his painting of the Versailles Chateau. Very appropriate on a few levels and it proudly hangs in our dining room.

Here is another watercolor from the 1992 sketch trip. This was done during another day trip from Nice along the French Riviera. Villefranche sur Mer and the surrounding area is where they filmed Dirty Rotten Scoundrels.

You have got to love Google Maps (with the help of maporama). Using the two, I was able to locate the set up for this watercolor. The subject is to the right of the map and I was sitting at the left end of the beach that crosses the page. And here is a shot of the actual subject. It is on the left of the photo.

Hopefully, you can see a bit of progress from the previous one. The greenery is decent, but it keeps it from being framed and hung. Kudos to anyone who can figure out what was added at a later date and was still done incorrectly.

Watercolor - Peillon, France

I am copying the idea that Paolo started on his blog. I have a bunch of drawings and photos in boxes that would be better served in the public eye. So I will also start posting them on a weekly basis. This one is from 14 years ago. Damn, I'm old.

My junior year of college was spent studying abroad in Versailles, France. During the year we had plenty of time off to travel and at the end we were encouraged to join one of a few handsketch or watercolour sketch trips. I opted for watercolour and we toured the French Riviera and Tuscany. I probably completed about 7 or 8 of them. I will post the best four. This is probably the second or third I had done. You should be able to see the progression. Peillon is a secluded hill town tucked up behind Nice and Monaco. Built largely of stone with roller coaster pedestrian streets like this one. Holy crap, I was just surfing and found a picture of the subject on some other page.

In other news, all this nostalgia has pushed me to commit my memories to paper. So I have created a blog about my memoirs of Europe. I have spent 19 months of my life over there and it had a significant affect on the direction of my life. So if it interests you, you can check it out. I am trying to go in chronological order.