On location in my imagination

(click on image to enlarge)

Winter gardens at Banff

Watercolour

©2012 Charlene Brown

This scene, the water garden at the Banff National Park Administration Building, is only slightly imaginary.  It exists in at least partial reality, as I have painted these little stone bridges and ponds in summer, with Mt. Cascade, my favourite mountain, shifted only slightly -- and this painting is derived from that composition. 
When I was there a couple of months ago, you couldn’t even get up to this location and all the water had been drained from the system, leaving only gaping pits and an occasional icicle where the falls are supposed to be. Also, unlike the Bow River into which it flows, the water on this mountain is not glacial – so its colour is imaginary as well.