Asmalı bahçe - Courtyard with grape vines

Painting of the Day (4 June)
Watercolor, 7"x5" $100

A continuation of my attempts to get on friendlier terms with the color green. Though the green is not too dominant in this painting, it was a good exercise. With a subject like this, I find that I often loose the freshness of the green leaves by going too dark, and not including enough mid-values, which is what I tried to address here.

Australian watercolor painter Robert Wade says in his book Robert Wade's Watercolor Workshop Handbook about green: "Most of us would love to leave as much of it out as possible, because it's the artist's horror color." Wade, who paints a lot of golf courses, goes on to say: "Somewhere in the painting I always try to introduce a spot of red, the complement of green." I have taken his advice to heart, with the poppies in my previous exercise, and with the patch of bright red inside the doorway in this one.

Mineke Reinders. Bloomington, IL. USA. Visit my daily painting blog.