After the usual buffet breakfast with lots of fresh fruit, we went back to the village of Xativa. We found a nice spot in a kind of town square where we painted. The scene was white umbrellas against some old buildings and a glimpse of a car headed away from us. Here's my sketch:
I got the car a little too big, and fell short of a good value pattern, but I began the painting. This is the result:
Lesson learned: I needed a good thumbnail value sketch to work from, and I really didn't have it. As Francesco Fontana says, if you have a good sketch, you can use it to complete the painting. I probably could improve this one by adding some details---or cropping, but I think I will just say it was a valuable lesson and not spend any more time on it. I also never really captured the darks under the umbrella. It was pleasant, though, to be out and painting in Spain!
In the afternoon, we worked in the studio on color schemes, such as developing a painting from a prevailing color, its complement and one other color. Francesco again talked about how to improve dark colors. Mixing a color with its complement will darken it, but it will not be black. Francesco had to tell us this many times! I am still working on it.
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