Here is an interesting progression I have been working on when not feeling like painting on the works in progress lined up in my studio. I went through some of my older paintings and found the painting below in the stack. I have always had a warm spot for this particular piece even though I have never been satisfied with it. The original plein air piece is at the bottom of this post. I added the dumpster back in - and using the photo reference, changed the shadows. I also added the vehicles and lamppost for more visual interest. Feels more complete.
The version above I did in 2007 trying to salvage the scene, but I think I did more harm than good, and taking out the dumpster and the driveway just left a very bare and boring foreground.
I was in Spain painting a few years ago and the bus stopped atop a knoll over looking Antiquerra. We were literally parked next to the city dump, but there was a wonderful view of the town. That view was a bit overwhelming to me at the time, and there were 60+ people lined up to paint it, so I went back to the bus to find some shade. The door to the "hold" was open and provided a great seat with shade, but the only view was of the end of this little street with a trash can. So that is what I attempted to capture. My relative relationships were not very good, to say the least. I had run out of film (hadn't gone digital yet) so I borrowed someone's polaroid (now this is seeming very dated) and took a not very good photo of the scene.
