Golden Field - Watercolour

I painted this watercolour from a photograph I took last summer.

The composition is fairly simple, but very effective with the trees and the path on the left creating a sense of mouvement towards he horizon.

Golden field - Watercolour by Benoit Philippe

I painted the trees by layering colours in alternance: sap green, raw umber and ultramarine. I wanted to keep the transparency of the watercolour while having deep shadows.

I applied masking fluid to reserve white areas in the trees and also for the grass in the foreground.

The field is painted very freely, wet on wet. I used a watercolour spay bottle (any spay bottle would do, including the one you can buy for perfumes) to keep the paper wet. I also sprayed some water onto the paint, which created and even wash and smooth grading between different colours.