Trevi Fountain Step 1 - the drawing

I decided to focus on an intimate, smaller section of the fountain for this piece instead of trying to capture the whole thing (maybe next time), so I picked the triton on the right side of Neptune.

The idea of the composition is to have the background in shadow so that the highest contrast (and focal point) will be on the man and horse. Then, the viewer's eye should travel with the water down over the rocks to the pool, then back up to the top again.

I use watercolor pencils to sketch out the composition because they mostly dissolve once I paint over them and the tiny marks that remain add little splashes of subtle color to the finished painting. One tip if you decide to use watercolor pencils as well: erasing them with clear water and a brush usually works better than using an eraser. You can see some areas where I've used water to blend some of the sketch lines and I've left the color.

I typically sketch all the shapes lightly first to get the placement right, then come back in with darker lines to refine the details. I don't include every detail at this point, just enough to know where the major shapes and white/light spots are.

Step-by-Step: Painting the Trevi Fountain

One of my favorite subjects from my travel to Italy was the plethora of incredible fountains that are found all over the country, especially around Rome. My past efforts to capture some of these have been alot of fun to paint and have been very well-received by my collectors. However, I haven't yet attempted to paint that most famous of fountains, the Trevi. Until now, that is.


One of my collector friends (you know who you are, Michael) has been hounding me to paint the Trevi for years now, but I've always been too busy with other series, commissions, etc. to attempt it. It's quite a challenging subject after all, mixing figurative elements and water, two of the most difficult subjects to paint.


Anyways, I'm throwing caution to the wind, and I'll be letting you watch as I tackle one of the most famous landmarks in all of Italy. I hope you enjoy it (and I sure hope it works out!)


Stay tuned...

Summer 2009 Schedule

Well, it looks like it's that time of year again. That time when people stop being jealous of our weather here in Arizona. When we're either in the air conditioning, the swimming pool, or covered with enough sun block to protect you on the actual surface of the sun. When the critters like scorpions and rattlesnakes come out and the snowbirds go home. And for some strange reason, there's not much happening with the art scene here this time of year. Hmmm.

That's why summer is the time for me to hit the road. No big Europe trips planned until at least next year, so my schedule looks about the same as it has the past couple years:


La Jolla Festival of the Arts
June 20 - 21
9 AM - 5 PM

Breckenridge Art Festival
July 24 - 26
10 AM - 6 PM

Park City Kimball Arts Festival
August 1 - 2
9 AM - 7 PM (6 PM Sunday)

Sausalito Art Festival
September 5 - 7
9 AM - 6 PM (5 PM Monday)


Hopefully, you can make it to one of these beautiful, high-caliber events to view my newest works. Please let me know if you need any further information as well.

And enjoy your beautiful summers, blah, blah, blah. You'll be shoveling snow again before you know it. :)

As If Watercolor Wasn't Already Hard Enough...

Do you ever feel like you just can't get the monkey off of your back?

Well, say hello to my five year old son whose two favorite things in the world are smiling/laughing and climbing on EVERYTHING (especially Dad). Just wanted to throw this in here for you parents out there who may be able to relate to this just a little as well as anyone else who may be thinking about working out of the house. Be prepared to work through ANY and ALL types of distractions!

(Anyone know a good chiropractor?)

New Original

I just wrapped up this brand new watercolor, "Antibes Door" (15" x 11"; $1,400). I painted it as a demonstration piece for an upcoming article in Watercolor Artist magazine (one of my favorites) that focuses on texture and light.

The door itself came from Antibes on the French Riviera, one of the Riviera towns that I really liked. My favorite part of this piece: it's a tie between the streaming shadows on the wall and how the texture turned out on the door.

Want to see how I painted it? Sorry, you'll have to wait until the article comes out :-) It's currently slotted for the October issue.

Anyone interested in adding this little gem to their collection should contact me directly (623-551-5692 H, 623-330-7647 C, or steve@stevestento.com) or come out to the La Jolla Festival of Fine Art on June 28 - 29 to view it in person.

Summer Schedule

Many, many thanks to those of you who came out to see my artwork at the La Quinta Art Festival, the Indian Wells Art Festival, and Superstition Mountain's Piazza Party over the past couple months. Whether it was your first time seeing my watercolors or your 50th (OK, stop stalking me), I hope you came away impressed and hopefully moved by the experience. After all, that's what it's all about. I'm very passionate about the things that I paint, and if you can feel some of that connection, then I've done my job.


Here's where you can see my newest works this summer:


La Jolla Festival of Fine Art
June 28 - 29
La Jolla, CA

Aspen Arts Festival
July 19 - 20
Aspen, CO

Breckenridge Main Street Art Festival
July 25 - 27
Breckenridge, CO

Sausalito Art Festival
August 30 - September 1
Sausalito, CA

So, there you have it. (And, no, it's not a coincidence that I'll be in a lot of beautiful places that are all cooler than Phoenix!) I hope you can make it to one of these fine events, and please let me know if you'd like any more information.

Night Scene - Step 10

Step 10 - Completion

For this final stage, I knew the sky needed to be stronger and darker to give the light areas the proper glow. Continuing to "push" a watercolor at this point can be a risky move, since it's not usually possible to go lighter again and you also never know when you're gonna have one of those "@%#*! water has a mind of its own" moments. That's just one of the thousand or so decisions you'll have to make during a painting, but, like I mentioned before, 9 times out of 10 I make the painting better by pushing it a little farther. The most important thing is to not be afraid to make that decision - it's not like it's your last painting ever and, no, your life does not depend on it, no matter how much time and paint you've already put into it.

Having made my decision to continue, I closed my eyes (just kidding), turned the piece upside down again and hit the upper part of the sky with a strong mixture of Alizarin Crimson and Pthalo Green. In this case, I'm really happy that I decided to go darker. Overall, the painting is very close to my initial plan, and I feel like everything is working (despite the fact that there are always little areas that only I notice where I could have handled things better).

So, there you have it, the Charles Bridge in Prague at night in watercolor. Hopefully, you're all ready now to go tackle that night scene that you've been putting off for the last three years!

Just remember, there's no such thing as the perfect painting, your next one's going to be your best, and it really is about the journey, not the destination.

Night Scene - Step 9

Step 9

At this stage of the painting, I'm adding the final darks and details to finish things up. I finished the tree over the middle part of the bridge, some of the rooftops, and the rest of the water.

Then, I always like to take the painting off of my table and put it across the room (at least 15 - 20 feet away) so that I can get a true feel for the type of impact it will have. I've been so close to it for so many hours, that this is the only way I can objectively see if it's matching my original idea for the piece and if it's truly working as a painting. In this case, I noticed right away that the sky wasn't nearly as strong as I wanted it to be. This is a scary time because it's so easy to ruin something in watercolor that you can't ever fix, but I know this will be a better piece if I can darken the sky and smooth out some of the brushstrokes.

Don't ever be afraid to keep working on something that needs it just because you're worried about making a mistake! You will learn so much more about painting by making that mistake than you will by being timid.

Night Scene - Step 8

Step 8

I've pretty much finished up the water here, and I'm pretty satisfied with how it's looking. The values and colors are working, so I will probably only need a few adjustments as I wrap things up.

As you can see, I've also added a couple more washes to the sky. The first one was basically a warm, dark mixture of Burnt Siena and Alizarin to smooth out some of the brush strokes and get rid of some of the Ultramarine Blue (too purple). The second wash was basically the same except this time, with the painting upside-down, I added a black mixture (Pthalo Green and Alizarin Crimson) that got heavier as I moved down towards the bottom.

At this stage in a painting, I spend as much time, if not more, just looking and analyzing as I do actually painting.

Night Scene - Step 7

Step 7

I started to really work on the water here. Starting on the left side, I painted a medium-dark purple-gray mixture around the light reflections. In some places, I bridged the gap between these two areas with a wash of pure Cadmium Red to give the lights a glow. Then, once dry, I came over the top of these areas with darker, vertical lines for the reflections of windows, dark shapes, etc. (Just make sure your reflections are directly below what's being reflected.) I made the reflections with jagged horizontal strokes to show the movement of the water.

I also finished some of the darker parts of the buildings behind the bridge, the bridge tower, and some of the bridge details.

Five Of My Favorite Living Watercolorists

Okay, this isn't an easy task. There are so many good watercolorists out there working today, that this is like trying to list my five favorite types of gelato or my five favorite sunsets ever witnessed. Stubborn guy that I am, I decided to try anyways, so here goes. In no particular order, these five artists "wow" me with their work every time I see it:

• Steve Hanks
• Paul Jackson
• Dean Mitchell
• H.C. Dodd
• Judy Morris

There's at least 10 more I could put in there (but then that would be my fifteen favorite, wouldn't it?) Anyways, if you like watercolor and you're not familiar with any of these artists, do yourself a favor and look them up.

Night Scene - Step 6

Step 6

I've added another wash to the sky. This time, I added a little more Ultramarine Blue to the mixture to darken it. I've got a ways more to go, but you can already see that the buildings are looking more "lit up". It's always interesting to see how changing one part of a painting (darkness, color, etc.) changes every other part as well. Each painting is a supreme balancing act, and you have to really know what you want the finished product to look like so you don't get lost in these middle stages and leave it unfinished.

I'm also ready to start working on the reflections in the water now. This will be a very important part of the final piece, so I really need to pay attention to how it's handled. The best way to paint water is to look it as abstract shapes and values and just paint what you see (as opposed to what you "think" you see - it's that whole right brain, left brain thing). Come to think of it, that's pretty much the best way to paint anything. If you get the shapes right and the values right, then you've got it. See, you had no idea painting was that easy!

I also worked a bit more on the dark parts of the bridge tower and the buildings to the left. They're getting closer to completion.

Night Scene - Step 5

Step 5

Ah, the sky. I figured that the only way to really have a deep, dark sky was to build up alot of layers. This first one is an attempt to establish the overall warm glow created by all of the city lights. I basically mixed up Burnt Siena and Alizarin Crimson with just a bit of Ultramarine Blue.

If you take a closer look at the photo, you'll notice that my pencil is now at the top. That's because I actually flipped the piece upside-down. That way, I could paint around all of the buildings (and especially the lights) without having to worry about the paint drying (which happens REALLY fast here in AZ) and leaving strange looking marks. It's also easier to add more blue towards the bottom (actually the top) so that the sky gets darker as it gets farther away from the lights, etc.

I'm not too worried about all the brush strokes you can see at this point, since I'll be adding many more layers before I'm through.

Completely unrelated thought:

Anyone looking for a quick laugh should check out Zach Braff's blog, http://www.zachbraff.com/. Back in the pre-kids days when we could actually sit down and watch a primetime TV show (and yes, I do know there's a little thing called tivo now), my wife and I loved the show Scrubs. It is goofy, yes, but also incredibly well written and innovative, and just a whole lot of fun. And I've liked just about every other thing he's been a part of. Anyways, his blog is about the same, a well written and funny stream of consciousness that lets us into his world in an honest and hilarious way.

Or, maybe it's just because we're both in our thirties and HUGE celebrities that I feel a connection (actually, I'm not even a celebrity in my own house.)

Either way, check it out.

Night Scene - Step 4

Step 4

More work on the darks here. I wanted to let the warm colors from the lights bleed down into the bridge, so I had to be careful to keep those edges soft (as opposed to the hard edges more commonly seen in watercolor.)

Notice also how the buildings begin to become more ambiguous as they recede off into the distance. With any landscape, things become less distinct and have less detail and contrast as they get farther away. The term for this is atmospheric perspective and, although somewhat difficult to achieve in watercolor, is a great way to establish depth.

Night Scene - Step 3

Step 3

I laid down the light reflections in the water using a variety of colors and working wet-into-wet to allow the colors to run together. I also started to add some of my first darks with the bridge, trees, and some of the windows, rooftops, etc. Notice how this already makes the buildings seem lighter.

I also put my first wash in the sky, keeping it wet, but being careful to paint around my light areas. I wanted the sky to have a very warm glow, so this first wash was pure Alizarin Crimson with a little Burnt Siena mixed in.