Summer in Maine

(C) 2015 Dale DiMauro

This is a watercolor inspired by our visit two summers ago, to North Haven, a small island off the coast of Maine. My wife and I took a ferry out and spent a full day exploring by bicycle and visiting with family. As in the watercolor, it was a glorious summer day with little humidity. We bicycled past this house a few times. You wouldn't know it from this angle but it looks down upon a small cove with boats moored nearby.

I like the various shades of green against the house and sky. Green says summer to me. However, I find green the most challenging color to work with at least in watercolor. If you use a green right out of the tube the color often is dull, flat and unexciting. So I have been experimenting with different combinations of blue and yellow for some time. One of my favorite mixtures is aureolin with prussian blue which creates a rich, vibrant, sod colored green, more on the yellowish than blue spectrum. Many greens from my experience appear gray and there is a whole range of these. I have not yet, found a way to utilize these gray-greens to full advantage.