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This is a pretty small painting – but most gouache paintings are as the medium almost seems to demand it. After the disastrous flowers of the other day, the feeling of overworking my paints, I decided to simplify. Yesterday’s beach scene is a good example of simplification. And today is a bit more complex of a painting, but it is still simplified.
To simplify things, I looked at the big areas. This meant the sand in the foreground, the sky, and the masses which make up the middle ground, both light and dark. Those were laid in first. From there, more details in a middle stage, and final details – the small stuff – were done. This also matched the brushes I used – big to medium to small. “The Three Bears” and the Goldilocks effect.
I also was a lot calmer when I did this painting, and I was in the studio, not in 85F weather with a steady breeze to dry out my paints and raise my temper! Lesson learned there.
Journey by Paper 
Not sure about the long building on the right, but the rest is nice. I like the red and white buildings.
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As always, thanks for your ideas. I actually hid part of the building with trees – should possibly do the same with the thing on the right! Trees hide a lot of faults. B-)
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And just to show how taste is individual, i think the long building fits, it balances, and creates curiosity. I have seen many walls, castles, etc in Europe that are connected to a building in use today. That was my first thought.
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Isn’t if funny how we all are different! Personally, the building is, in my opinion, a bit too big for the distance, especially the window. But given how small the painting is, I left it. I scanned the picture and realized the building needed a bit toning down, and that’s when I put in the tall trees. Doing so did reduce the horizontal line – one too many perhaps – or broke it up enough with a vertical. I liked the tree-added version better!
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