Views of Venice

All painters must go to Venice! It is the one city that, more than any other that I’ve visited, encapsulates the glory of times gone by, but is still a vibrant and exciting place. To arrive at the bus or train station and to see the Grand Canal straight before you sets the watercolour pulse racing!

Margaret and I spent a week in Venice during April and, although I had very little time for sketching, as we were with a group, I did take nearly 300 photographs. On my return to the studio I soon got busy with my brushes and you can see some of the results here.

watercolour painting of dawn in venice
Venice Dawn. Watercolour 22ins x 15ins.
watercolour painting of venice canal
The Byways of Venice. Watercolour 15ins x 11ins.
Watercolour painting of Venice gondola
Turning the Corner, Venice. Watercolour 15ins x 11ins.

All the paintings are made with a very limited palette of colours. Venice Dawn uses just two, MaimeriBlu Berlin Blue and Orange Lake, with a little bit of blue gouache on the gondolas. The other two paintings used a more muted palette of Cobalt Blue Light and Venetian Red. There are some small areas where I combined Raw Sienna with Venetian Red, and the red highlights on the gondolas were made with Cadmium Red Light.  The greenish tinge of the canals is made from Cobalt Blue Light and Raw Sienna, with a touch of Primary Yellow. These are all MaimeriBlu colours. In all the paintings I used a few flicks of white gouache for highlights.

In all three of these paintings about 90% is done with just the main two or three colours, described above. Keeping to a limited palette gives a great feeling of simplicity, harmony and unity to the painting, so it’s always my preferred method of working. I’ll show you some more new paintings soon!