In this painting, I wanted to capture the feeling of a bright and warm sunny day along the shore so I kept the values quite light except for the bird's shadow. I started by painting the background waves in a loose and free manner trying for movement and color more than anything else. The gull was also painted in a somewhat loose way aiming for form without getting too caught up in the details. The warm reflected light on the belly of the gull was as important as getting the structure of the bird right then some smaller details were added last of all. The foreground was finished off with just a few indications of broken shells etc. Size is 12" x 9", watercolor on Grumbacher paper.
1 comment:
Great job with our local default gull. I don't know whether you are familiar with the Canadian wildlife illustrator and artist, Barry Kent MacKay. Over the years I have acquired quite a bit of his work.
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