Mont Saint-Hilaire, revisited

Mont St-Hilaire, Quebec. Watercolor on Arches cold press, 21" x 14."

We went hiking on Mont Saint-Hilaire about a month ago, and I was struck with its iconic shape against the fields of the flat St. Lawrence floodplain. This painting was started before I went away, and finished up during the past two days. I learned quite a bit in the process. It's larger than most of the watercolors I've done lately, and that was good: it helped me splash the color on with big brushes and work more freely. The foreground was especially fun to paint. This scene would also work well as an oil painting, but I enjoyed trying to approach it using watercolor. It's also a good precursor to some of the paintings of fields and hills that I want to do from my trip to central New York.

Here are a couple of details, approximately life-size, and an earlier stage of the painting.

 

 

Comments

[Laura]

Lovely colors! The details are stunning... the foreground elements are gorgeous. The tree line as it stands now, to my eye, serves as a kind of brake to the force of the painting. Might you add some dashes of the foreground's warm tones in that strip to make a transition (and a point of connection) between the mountain and the foreground? Just a thought.
I envy you the proximity of such beautiful countryside and so look forward to your future explorations in paint of this and other subjects!
xoxo,
L

[Beth]

To be honest, Laura, I wish I could take that tree out completely! It's bothered me the whole time - but such is the angst of watercolor. I'll try your suggestion, it might help a good deal. Thanks.

[Hattie]

There is something strange about this painting. Unsettling.

[Beth]

I agree with you, Hattie. There's something unsettling, even ominous to me about these monadnocks in the middle of such a flat landscape. It always feels to me like they shouldn't be there.

Here is a link to the finished painting, where you can see all the stages it went through. Going further with Laura's suggestion, I took the tree out entirely, and it's an improvement. http://www.flickr.com/photos/46088325@N02/sets/72157636654159444/

[andrea]

Hi Beth. The hard edge of mountain against sky is what bothers me. What if you made it more atmospheric, slightly a la J.M.W. Turner's Blue Rigi? I love the foreground detail.

[Jean]

Beautiful. In some ways, though, I like the earliest version best - just form and colour.

[Beth]

Thanks for the comment, Andrea. I did soften the hard edge a bit in the revised version, here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/46088325@N02/sets/72157636654159444/ But I didn't want to make an atmospheric painting this time; it was a very clear day and the distant details were quite sharp and distinct, as is often the case in Quebec. What stuck me about the mountain was how sharp it was, which made it seem closer and more strange. Also, since this is a watercolor I'm limited with how much reworking I can do. But stay tuned, more explorations to come!

Thanks, Jean. I know what you mean, and like I said to Andrea, I'll be revisiting this subject. As with others in the past, I seem to need to make a realistic painting first...and I also want to go back out there and do some drawings. With winter approaching pretty fast, the look of the landscape has changed a lot in just the past two weeks.