Hamilton Road

Reference Paintings:

Process of Painting:

Describe:

This piece is a landscape of a trail in a forest. The medium used is watercolors. The sky is depicted to have slight hints of pink, purple, and blue, indicating that the painting is meant to be set in the late afternoon or evening. The trees lining the trail are rich with red, orange, and dusty yellow hues to bring the season of fall to life. The trail leads back to the unknown, with the trees meeting to close off the trail to the viewer's eye. Green with brown tint bushes gather at the sides of the trail, lining it from start to finish.

Analyze:

Different means of techniques are riddled all throughout the painting. The dusty tan road has the salt technique on it to give it more of a gritty feel, like a real dirt trial would have. Wet on wet was the initial technique used and then wet on dry was introduced to bring some more life and dimension to the trees. The reference photos above were used to help get a feel of different colors that could be used as well as how a trail going off in the distance looked. The piece is titled, "Hamilton Road", because there is a song named the same, and I picture going down the trail that I painted while listening to that song.

Interpretation:

This piece has meaning because going down a dirt trail in a forest of changing leaves is the epitome of fall to me. I used to live in Pennsylvania, and there was a forest that I would always walk through during the fall. This painting reminds me of that and how time comes and goes. Again, the song "Hamilton Road", I also chose for the title because when I think of that song, I think of this dirt pathway surrounded by rich colors. Fall is my favorite season, and even if I cannot feel it, painting images of it helps to bring my home a little closer to me.

Judgement:

I would consider the sky one of the strength in this painting. I really like the way it is subtle, giving a light amount of definition to the cloud streaks made. It looks like a dreaming early evening sky without getting to harsh with the colors. I also like the way the tree trunks turned out for the most part. There are different colors layered to give it a dynamic feel. However, one weakness that I had for this painting is the pathway. For me, it was hard to get it to go off to nowhere, yet look like there is more beyond. I would like to experiment with this effect more so that I can get better at it because I had quite some trouble for it in this piece. I also would like to improve my leaves for the trees. Luckily this was a watercolor so it could blend together and look like I meant to do that. However, I am not the best at painting or drawing trees, so I would like to improve that weakness.