Construction of an old gas pump, San Miguel de Allende.

Pen, ink and watercolor on Watercolor Handbook Journal 8 x 8 in

With guests still with us in San Miguel de Allende, I've been busy and saved one sketch I did almost a week ago to post today. The old gas pump located in the corner of Juarez and Mesones street, rusted but still standing, is a curious object in downtown of San Miguel Allende that tourists and sketchers like me find interesting. I sat conveniently in one of the tree trunks like the one in the illustration. I liked the shaded side when I sat. I did the ink work here and watercolor it later. The pump was made with several glazes of paint starting with yellow ochre, then a mix of burnt sienna and alizarin crimson and last burnt umber. I removed some paint of each glaze while the paint was wet with a textured kitchen paper towel to simulate rust.  When I thought I was done, the stone ground was blank. After some hesitation (I'm sure you are familiar with that feeling, about whether the sketch is finished or should you continue) I used liquid frisket to do the grid, then I watercolor the ground with only cold color blue and purple, and for the foreground sidewalk I also used an additional warm color, burnt sienna. I let the magic of watercolor happen, the paint blended it self. At the end the gas pump looked better in the streets with that perspective achieved by the grid and the choice of colors.