For the realization of the painting “The Vineyard” I began by making some preparatory sketches with the intention of familiarizing myself with the subject. I tried different techniques with greater or lesser success, but the idea was above all to become aware of what it would mean to take them to the large size that the final painting would have on a small scale, as the sketches were.
I then made numerous drawings and tests in search of the final composition I had in mind.
Once the different tests were done, the idea was being defined. Then I made a more defined drawing with the composition of the tree that I would have in the paper space.
In this phase I also introduced the golden spiral composition that I intended to use in the drawing. My idea was that the foliage of the vine would have that spiral shape and that its point of interest would be in the lower left cluster. To reinforce this interest, with the watercolor color, I differentiated it from the rest of the clusters by giving it a warmer, redder tone.
While defining the drawing I also researched the color that I would later apply. I made numerous tests with the colors I had available as well as the mixtures resulting from joining several of those colors. My concern was, above all, the dominant green that the painting would have. With the color tests I was able to check the proportions of each primary color as well as the textures and granulations obtained with these mixtures.
Later I started to draw the painting itself, to real scale.
The process of drawing the whole tree in pencil was slow and quite exhausting but I was aware of the importance that this part of the process would have because once I started to smear watercolor the drawing could not be corrected. I had to “waste” all the necessary time in this phase to later apply the color, since it is watercolor, you cannot correct the drawing as you go along, it has to be well defined from the beginning.
More details in the Processes section and in the Zoom section.
