Oregon City Porch (17 x 13 watercolor) $300
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buildings and bridges
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November 26, 2016 1:25 pm
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August 16, 2016 6:12 pm
View From The Cloister (watercolor 15 x 23) $600
This is Westminster Abbey as seen through the wrought iron work of the cloister. It is the view visitors now see just before they exit the abbey complex. But for hundreds of years it was the view seen by the monks on their way to services.
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August 9, 2016 1:15 pm
Snapshot Cafe (watercolor 14 x 23) $600
Despite the lack of canals and only a single bicycle, this is Amsterdam on a summer evening. But it could be anyone of a number of European street scenes.
The title is a bit of a pun. I painted the picture from a series of snapshots, and girls in the foreground are sharing a snapshot. I hope the atmospheric nature of the painting has little to do with snapshots.
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August 5, 2016 4:06 pm
Dreaming of Prague (watercolor 16 x 21) $600
Impressionists view of the Saint Charles Bridge at night.
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August 2, 2016 2:47 pm
Pillars of the Humanities (watercolor 17 x 21) $600
This is my first painting since returning from our month long odyssey to Europe. I began with the Pantheon in Paris. I made the cream colored columns vibrant to match the intellectual vibrancy of the persons buried in the crypt: Voltaire, Victor Hugo, Emile Zola, Jean Jacques Rousseau, Louis Braille, Pierre Curie, Marie Curie, Alexandre Dumas.
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February 28, 2016 6:47 pm
Cowboy in Chinatown (watercolor and gouache 16 x 22) $600
There is still a Chinatown in Victoria, B.C., but it’s only a few blocks long now. The Fantan Cafe dominates the street. It’s still a fun and colorful place to visit. The entrance arch remains, and they still hang Chinese lanterns.
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February 15, 2016 12:36 pm
Diocletian Courtyard (watercolor 13 x 18) $500
This is an upward view of the courtyard behind the Diocletian Baths currently the Santa Maria degli Angeli e dei Martiri, in Rome.
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February 13, 2016 11:17 am
"Three Luccan Towers" (17 x 19 watercolor) $500
Another Italian painting, this time of Lucca. The view is from a window in yet a fourth tower. I will have to paint the tower we climbed. The oak trees growing from it’s roof give it a surreal feel.
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November 9, 2015 12:31 pm
Evening at the Louvre (watercolor 14 x 22) $500
The glass pyramid as seen through one of the Louvre’s arches.
Or purchase a fine art print here.
October 24, 2015 2:47 pm
City Portal (12 x 22 watercolor) $500
The Art Institute of Chicago again, this time from the inside. While my daughter gift shopped, I took a whole series of photographs of the two doors to Michigan Ave. The great doors with their iconic lamps and the people silhouetted in front fascinated me.
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September 26, 2015 10:49 am
Just Before the Museum Opens (watercolor 17 x 22) $600
I love city light. The shafts of light created by openings in the tall buildings, the reflectivity of building and pavement, and the flat surfaces for shadows all lead to one thing—drama.
This particular drama is the long shadows and the warm glow of a Chicago winter morning. The crowd is up early and waiting for The Art Institute of Chicago to open up. The crowd and bus hide one lion, but the other can be seen peeking out from behind the traffic light.
Or purchase a fine art print here.
September 22, 2015 11:50 am
Downtown Spring Outing (watercolor 15 x 23) $500
I took my daughter college looking this Spring. As part of that trip we got to stay a couple nights in downtown Chicago. This is Wabash Avenue just North of Adams and about a block from The Art Institute of Chicago. The mother and child are just passing Palmer House Hotel. A light snow had just melted and by our Oregon standards it was nippy.
Or purchase a fine art print here.
September 25, 2014 7:24 am
Italian Heat (watercolor 15 x 22) Reserved for Western Federation of Watercolor Societies 2015 Annual Show
We visited Florence in the heat of summer. The shady narrow streets opening up into white hot plazas continues to fascinate me. Couples biking over the rough stone streets had their own heat.
This painting may be purchased through the 2015 Western Federation of Watercolor Societies Annual Show. Or purchase a fine art print.
September 8, 2014 6:24 am
September 3, 2014 7:24 am
I had a stellar week in the Artisan Village at the Oregon State Fair. I sold seven originals. Three of Riomaggiore on the Italian Med:
An Italian Jewel (16 x 23 watercolor) SOLD
A Slice of Riomaggiore (10 x 12 watercolor) SOLD
Riomaggiore Hillside (16 x 22 watercolor) SOLD
Two of Florence:
- The Ultimate Alley View (12 x 19 watercolor) SOLD
- July in Florence (13 x 23 watercolor) SOLD
One of Oxford:
- Oxford Lane (watercolor 13 x 19) SOLD
And one of The Valley of the Gods in Utah:
Looking Down From Moki Dugway (14 x 24 watercolor) SOLD
My “problem” now is putting together enough paintings for my feature at Art in the Valley this coming October.
August 27, 2014 10:27 pm
Oxford Bike (watercolor 17 x 19) SOLD
I poured this painting at the Oregon State Fair on yesterday and spent this afternoon finishing up the brushwork. I rather like it. The greens feel very England to me.
This painting has sold, but you may still purchase a fine art print.
June 7, 2014 1:34 pm
Hunchbacked Gargoyle (16 x 18 watercolor) $400
The view from atop Notre Dame, Paris.
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May 25, 2014 3:21 pm
Top of Milan (watercolor 14 x 22) Reserved for Spring Watercolor Society of Oregon Show
When we Armitages travel, we climb things–towers, monuments, mountains, cathedrals, arches– we generally go up for the purpose of looking down. We are never disappointed. We weren’t disappointed in Milan. But the Milan Cathedral rooftop is different. The rooftop itself is an amazing place to be. It would be an amazing place were it on the ground floor. Here is my first painting of the marble forest that lives atop the Milan Duomo.
This painting may be purchased through the Watercolor Society of Oregon Spring 2015 show. Or purchase a fine art print.
May 11, 2014 4:11 pm
March 9, 2014 1:34 pm
Between Amusements (17 x 21 watercolor) $700
For the last four years I’ve been taking pictures of the Oregon State Fair confident that with all those people and colors there must be a good painting in there somewhere. Four years of pictures with images taken from four different photos and I finally have one.
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January 29, 2014 12:21 pm
Bike Lucca (watercolor 16 x 21) $700
This is Lucca. It could be just about any narrow lane in the old part of a Tuscan city, but this particular lane is in Lucca. The bicyclist is appropriate, because Lucca is a bicyclist’s city. The old city wall around town has been paved as a broad street for pedestrians and cyclists, and everyone, natives and tourists alike seem to spend much of their time biking the wall. Down in the city, bikes are as common as at Oxford.
Fine art prints can be purchased here.
Here is a view of Lucca from the city wall:
Two Towers (Digitally Altered Photo)
Prints of Two Towers can be purchased here.
January 24, 2014 4:10 pm
Gap in the Wall (13 x 19 watercolor) $450
This is Acoma Pueblo again. This time looking up at an intriguing hole in the wall.
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January 21, 2014 1:59 pm
Sky City Mission (watercolor 16 x 20) SOLD
Built in the 1200s and located atop a 365 foot high mesa, Acoma Pueblo is one of the most spectacular of the nineteen modern pueblos of New Mexico. It looks like what it is, the home of the descendants of the Anasazi peoples of Mesa Verde and Chaco Canyon. The San Estevan Del Rey Mission Church I’ve painted is a late comer to the pueblo, built between 1629 and 1641. The church was built by order of the Spanish government. Although it was built with slave labor, the Acoma people are proud of it, and did not destroy it during 1680 revolt against the Spanish. It is still a place of Christian worship today.
The building is made of sandstone and adobe, rather than adobe bricks. The result is sturdier than adobe, but when in need of plaster very rough looking. The stones were very much visible when we visited this last summer, though I’ve seen pictures of the Mission looking as smooth as any brick adobe building. I like the rough stones and I’ve done my best to give a sense of them here.
My painting is entirely poured (see a description of the pouring method here) from just four pigments: raw sienna, burnt sienna, quinacrididone rose, and dioxion purple. The hard edges caused by mask used for pouring and the limited palette, give the painting a raw graphic feel that reminds of seeing that massive building in the July heat.
This painting is sold, but you can still purchase a fine art print.
January 17, 2014 1:29 pm
An Italian Jewel (16 x 23 watercolor) SOLD
Riomaggiore is built on the cliffs above it’s harbor, rising chaotically up in a happy clutter of homes. The effect is charming whether seen from the harbor looking up or from the narrow streets looking down. The final shape of the village looks like a jewel set into the hills.
This painting has sold, but you may still purchase a fine art print here.
January 14, 2014 2:03 pm
Riomaggiore Hillside (16 x 22 watercolor) SOLD
We visited the Cinque Terre or Five Lands in 2012. Clinging to the the cliffs about the Italian riviera, these charming wine and fishing villages are an Italian national park and a tourist magnet during the summer. I painted Monterrosso, the largest of these villages last year. This is Riomaggiore, the smallest of the Cinque Terre, and the first village many tourists see. It was the first village we visited. And yes we were charmed by it’s pocket sized harbor and steep narrow streets. But these first paintings are not of the houses on the harbor cliffs, but the vineyard hills.
A Slice of Riomaggiore (10 x 12 watercolor) SOLD
These paintings have sold, but you may still purchase fine art prints here.
October 28, 2013 10:48 am
Late Afternoon Florence (13 x 22 watercolor) $600
Florence is worth visiting just to walk the streets. The twisting turning little alleys are endlessly fascinating. The light pours through in dramatic shafts between the buildings spotlighting slivers of streets and buildings.
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October 15, 2013 1:15 pm
A Spire of Saint Paul's (11 x 15 watercolor) $300
This is one of the twin clock tower spires of Saint Paul’s Cathedral in London. I love Saint Paul’s Cathedral though it is nothing like the Gothic Cathedrals I fell in love with on my first trip the England. Unlike England’s early cathedrals, Saint Paul’s was designed by a single man, Sir Christopher Wren and built over just thirty years. The result is a clean coherent building rather unlike the the quirky cathedrals I first admired.
Wren designed and saw built numerous churches in the vicinity to compliment and be complimented by the cathedral. But in the London Blitz practically the entire neighborhood was bombed and burned to the ground. The cathedral is now surrounded by modern offices. The Millennium Bridge now leads directly to it providing a very modern show case for Wren’s jewel.
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October 11, 2013 6:21 pm
Changing in Milan (14 x 21 watercolor) $600
In our month long odyssey to Europe last year we had only one really long travel day, but it was a dozy. We left London in morning to take the train to Paris. We boarded the train without a hitch and ate lunch as we emerged from the channel tunnel in France. We walked the streets and had dinner in Paris. Then we boarded the night train Milan.
I’ve heard mixed reviews of the night train, but it did well for us. Our cabin mate was a gorgeous young Frenchmen who man managed to be both chivalrous and bashful at the same time. The cabin was spacious and the bunks comfortable. We agreed to an early bedtime and all fell asleep easily. Which is surprising because the trip was tinged with worry because Italy was scheduled for a railway strike, and we intended to go on from Milan to Rome.
So it was with some relief that we arrived in Milan in the wee hours to discover our connection to Rome was still on the board. Relief and time to enjoy the beauty of the modern railway station with the morning sun lighting up the tracks’ exit to the greater world.
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June 6, 2013 5:20 pm
The Ultimate Alley View (12 x 19 watercolor) SOLD
A colorful back alley view of the Duomo, Florence, Italy.
This painting has sold, but you may still purchase a fine art print.
April 9, 2013 7:24 pm
Waiting Bike (13 x 19 watercolor) SOLD
This painting has sold, but you may still purchase a fine art print.
March 25, 2013 5:12 pm
Monterosso Cafe (watercolor 16 x 22) $600
The Cinque Terre, or five lands do not have much in the way of tourist sites. They are the tourist site. The five coast hugging Italian villages feature brightly colored townhouses, residential streets made up of nothing more than a flight of stairs, beautiful coastal trails, and tight picturesque beaches. In July of last year they were also hot as blazes and ought to have been uncomfortable, but the narrow shady streets, and cool ocean made up for the heat. Oh, and there was gelato too, lots of handmade gelato.
We visited the four villages actually on the coast, and dipped our toes in the water at more the one beach. We also climbed innumerable stairs just for the fun of climbing and looking down. This painting is of Monterosso, the largest of the five, and the one with the widest flattest beaches. We stopped to sample the gelato at the cafe. We ate it while watching our girls play in the warm surf.
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March 20, 2013 2:50 pm
Bridge of Sighs (13 x 19 watercolor) SOLD
This is Hertford Bridge, more commonly known as the The Bridge o Sighs, after the The Bridge of Sighs in Venice. It connects the two quads of Hertford College, in Oxford, England. It doesn’t really resemble Venice’s Bridge of Sighs, but it is beautiful, and quintessentially Oxford. We visited in the late afternoon when street was beautifully shadowed.
March 15, 2013 3:49 pm
Oxford Lane (watercolor 13 x 19) SOLD
A little taste of Oxford—another poured painting.
This painting has sold, but you may still purchase a fine art print.
March 2, 2013 8:48 am
Gothic Specter (11 x 15 watercolor) $200
The Gothic archways surrounding the quads in churches and colleges have always intrigued me. This one happens to be at Christchurch, in Oxford, but it could be one of hundreds in Britain. The ribbed ceilings and the slanting light from the quad are always both beautiful and romantic.
In this painting I exaggerated the contrast poured the colors.
February 25, 2013 10:31 am
The Colossus (12 x 15 watercolor) $400
This building needs no introduction. If there is a ruin that everyone recognizes, it is Roman Colosseum. Even in ruins, it is an impressive building. It dominates the horizon, larger even than you expect to be.
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February 24, 2013 8:22 am
Clock Cafe (12 x 16 watercolor) $400
The d’Orsay Musee in Paris, was once a railway station. The original exterior clocks now serve as windows on the upper floor. I painted one of them a few months ago. That clock is opposite the gift shop and attracts as many tourists as the paintings. The other clock serves as the window in the museum cafe giving the cafe a charm all it’s own. Here it is.
I poured this painting is a similar manner to the first clock painting.
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February 23, 2013 4:34 pm
Shining Out of the Rain (12 x 15 watercolor) $400
Westmister Abby, The Parliament Building, and the new super Farris wheel the London Eye, dominate the Westminster end of London. The buildings are gritty with smog, and yet the marble still shines in the sun. Here are two of the shining towers of the Abby.
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February 17, 2013 12:48 pm
Rue Galande (watercolor 19 x 13) $500
Another painting taken from our trip to Europe last summer. This charming little street is close to Nortre Dame, but at least a little off the beaten path. Like many of the streets in the area, it curves charmingly.
I poured this painting in much the same manner as July in Florence. The process is much like batik and leads to clear color passages that make buildings glow.
July in Florence (13 x 23 watercolor) $600
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February 6, 2013 1:06 pm
And Suddenly the Duomo (15 x23 watercolor) Reserved
Old town Florence streets are shaded lanes so narrow they almost feel like tunnels running at irregular angles to each other. The view at the end of the tunnel is often as not another narrow lane cutting the street off at not quite a right angle. But here there the streets open into plazas with startling sunny views of churches, cathedrals, bridges, train stations and castles. Walking from our apartment, the Duomo complex burst upon us in much the same way–the light at the end of the tunnel.
Another poured watercolor painting, a process much like batik.
This painting is reserved for a show but you may purchase a fine art print.
January 30, 2013 5:20 pm
Paris Giant (watercolor 18 x 24) SOLD
When we travel, we Armitages climb things. In Paris we climbed Nortre Dame and the Arch d’ Triumph. But we took the elevator at the Eiffel Tower. We had tickets for the evening we arrived at ten thirty. We choose the evening and only the second platform out of necessity because two of the four elevators had been out of commission all summer. It turned out to be a delightful choice. It was our only nighttime view from above, and such a view it was. The Seine with city lights is a sight to see.
The Eiffel Tower itself is a spectacular view at night and we were there when the lights came on. The colors of the lights have changed over the years. When we visited they were predominately gold. The sky was black despite the early rain. The wet lawn and paths leading to the tower added to the effect. Walking to the tower across the park was a plus too. The vista leading up to the tower is grand and seemingly endless.
I took the photo for this painting on our way back through the wet to the metro. We didn’t mind standing in the wet to look one last time at Paris’ four legged giant.
This painting has sold, but you may still purchase a fine art print.
