This painting resides at my son's law firm, Bradshaw & Bickerton Law Firm in Austin, TX and was painted in 2012. It was the first time I had painted such a large canvas. Most of the painting was painted with a palette knife and it was painted in sections starting with the sky and moving down. Painting stages and some design notes are below.
The first stage: I drew a detailed sketch of the mission and bell tower as that was going to be the main subject of the painting and I wanted to paint that as accurately as possible. I wasn't too concerned with sketching other objects accurately as I knew I'd probably change them once I started painting. During the entire painting process, I had to re-paint portions and make adjustments so that the design would be pleasing to the eye and I also had to make sure all the colors were in harmony.
Next stage: I wanted the focal point to be at the end of the road, so I painted that area with a bright, light color next to a very dark color so it would catch your eye. I intentionally painted the sides of the buildings a slightly different color so as not to make them monotonous.
Next stage: I painted the main portion of the buildings and started painting the road. Originally, I was going to put a tree in the right foreground to cast a shadow across the road, but later changed my mind as the painting progressed.
Next stage: I painted the bell tower of the mission and the big tree in front of the mission. I'll have to admit at this point I didn't know what I was going to put in the field to the right and left of the road. My original idea wasn't going to work, so now I had to do some re-designing. I thought of many objects and then decided on haystacks and a clothes line on the right side and a garden on the left. After painting the clothes line and two haystacks it seemed something was still missing and that's when I decided to add a third haystack. I left an area of the road unpainted as I originally thought I'd put something tall in the field on the right to cast a shadow across half the road. But, near the end, I decided to continue to put the road in sunlight.
Next stage: The painting was coming together better than I had hoped and I didn't want to ruin it by messing up the left foreground. I thought about putting more haystacks, big rocks or other objects, but nothing seemed to fit. I finally decided on a garden bordered by a rock wall with steps. At the end I had to go back and make minor changes all over the painting as I kept seeing problems. This painting taught me a good lesson: Have a better idea/design before you start instead of changing the design in "real-time".
Next stage: The finished painting on my easel.
Thanks for reading. -Bob
