Blue

Painting Finished: April 24, 2022

Markino enjoyed walking along the Thames, and so many of his paintings depict bridges and embankments. Here is my attempt to copy his painting Chelsea Embankment. Since the painting, has such vivid blues around the top and the left side, I began by dousing the paper in water and then adding lots of blue paint. I wanted to keep the rest of it relatively white to make room for the other colors.

If you use a lot of water, I'd recommend not letting the painting sit on a wet surface to dry. My painting ended up getting stuck to the plate and the paper got damaged (lower left corner) trying to pull it up. Once I did the initial wash, I sketched the layout. Then I layered more blue (keeping space for the street lamps) and began to add oranges and browns along the bottom.

Then I continued layering the color. Sometimes waiting for the paper to dry to get distinct lines, other times adding a bit of water to make it blurrier. I added yellows and deeper some deeper blues around the street lamps to make it seem more like the light was shining through mist. I also started to add the shelving in the coffee stall.

I painted the figure in the coffee stall and carefully added the lamp and the outline of objects on the shelving. I finally started to add the deeper black of the lamppost and shadows and painted the sidewalk, creating a thick brown line between it and the road. I also added some more red hues to the bottom to make it stand out a little bit more and add color other than brown.

Lastly, I painted in the figures with their back turned to us and added more shading to make it seem more blended and misty. I ended up not adding all the figures mostly because I forgot there existence until it was too late. I had already added too much coloring to where the couple with the umbrella needed to be and I could bear painting over it.