Dust on the Spokes

Sep 13

2 min read

Watercolor Painting by Dennis Pendleton. In the Outdoor Historical Museum where we paint in my sketchbook workshop, there are lots of antique "props" and I couldn't resist painting this handsome old cart. I don't know why the wheels were painted yellow but it definitely made for a more interesting watercolor. In my preliminary pencil sketch, I placed the cart in the middle of the composition so that the yellow wheel, the focal point, would be off center and close to the bottom border.

With a few pencil lines to indicate the fence and the metal tub hanging on the fence, I began painting. The pencil sketch was kept simple because I was working against the changing sunlight. Also, with a very simple pencil sketch, I can use the paint brush full of color to do some of the drawing.

Lemon yellow with bits of burnt sienna were used for the wheel and the other wheel in shadow was indicated with burnt sienna mixed with ultramarine blue. The cart is a mixture of olive green and cerulean blue with ultramarine blue added for the shadows. The cart was full of twigs, grasses and weeds and I drew those in with my paintbrush full of yellow ochre, burnt sienna and raw umber while leaving slivers of unpainted white paper. The picket fence is a mixture of yellow ochre plus cobalt violet and the dark green behind it is a combination of olive green and perylene green.

That area behind the fence is a garden and I tapped in a few yellow dots to indicate plants. Those yellow dots relate back to the yellow wheel and tie the painting together. Cerulean blue mixed with brilliant orange created the different grays that I used for the metal tub hanging on the fence and the gravel path through the fence was painted with the same grays. To keep the area above the gravel path simple I painted an abstract shape that relates to the fence without repeating it exactly.

To finish, I put some visible brush strokes of olive green in the foreground with some darker green lines to indicate grasses. Plein air painting can be fun and frustrating at the same time so concentrate on trying out ideas to see if they work and enjoy the process. Happy Painting! Dennis Pendleton

The paintings from the Sunday emails are for sale starting at $125. If you are interested, send an email to me at pendletonstudio@gmail.com