It is the beginning of boating season here in the Thousand Islands area on the St. Lawrence River. I love the water and boating, and soon I will be launching my own craft once again. The St. Lawrence Seaway has been open to shipping for several months now and will remain open until late autumn, alllowing ships from all over the world to reach ports all around the Great Lakes, deep in the interior of Canada and the United States .
This is a freighter from Europe that I saw several years ago as it was approaching the Thousand Island Bridge, between the U.S. mianland and Wellesley Island, N.Y. I loved the powerful mass of the ship, rising off of the water like some displaced, highrise architecture. I found the persepective leading to the arch span of the bridge in the distance to be an interesting design that appealed to me. The rolling clouds overhead seemed to enforce the energy and power of the massive ship churning upstream to Toronto, Detroit and perhaps many ports beyond.
Once I had worked out the composition to my satisfaction, I transferred the drawing to a 16" X 20" stretched canvas. The next step was to spray the drawing with fixative to prevent smearing when I started to paint.
After fixing the canvas, I applied a mixture of matt medium, burnt umber and cadmium red, to create a warm, earthy ground. This acrylic mixture is mostly matt medium to maintain a high degree of transparency so that my pencil drawing remains very visible. The warm colours will be complimentary to the cool blues of this waterscape. At this stage I am always eager to see some local colours applied to this ground.
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