:: A promise ::

The other afternoon, when you fell asleep on my shoulder, I drifted off, too. But before I did, it occurred to me looking around at all of your things and your work and going through years of work in my mind, that of all your work, you are still your most beautiful. The most beautiful work of all.
— Letter from Patti Smith to Robert Mapplethorpe found on Brain Pickings

I promised one of my friends that I would paint some paintings in her sketchbook and then forward these to France… and I finalized the last painting today. Fiou! So the paintings will be on their way off to France this Tuesday.

I woke up this morning, painted on location and then drove off to Montreal to join the Montreal Urban Sketchers to paint an old church in Old Montreal. Yes I was late… Jumping in my car to drive to Montreal, it was quite amazing to see that in Montreal there are no traces of snow whatsoever, but in Rigaud? We are still knee deep in it! While I was painting the backdrop trees I was thinking of Peter Doig, an artist that I greatly admire and I started painting my trees in his way… and they turned out looking like a mountain -)

Mistakes? I keep repeating the same mistakes over and over again. I thought for a very long time that when I painted less, I became rusty… But now I think that we forget the mistakes or how to prevent the mistakes and a little bit rusty too. When you are painting on a day-to-day basis, you do not forget that snow must be painted in one long sweep as opposed to short stances! You do not forget to wet the paper behind your skies. You do not forget that mixing certain colours together they become muddy. Oh well, I think that I should start writing down the important lessons that I have learned over the years.

Paper: Handbook created by my friend Chi Mai
Fountain Pen: Platinum Desk Pen EF DP1000AB
Ink: Noodlers’ Lexington Grey
Colours: Q. Gold, Burnt Sienna, Violet & Indanthrone Blue
Location: Rigaud, Québec, Canada