Cityscape Painting

Here's a simple painting that anyone can do.

It's an easy project for beginners and would be good for a painting party.

If you like colorful, slightly abstract paintings, this one's for you.

I love cityscapes because you can add as much or as little detail as you want!

Let's get started!

You'll need the following supplies:

Tabletop easel

12" x 16" Canvas board

Acrylic paints- Purple, Blue, Turquoise, Green, Yellow, Orange, Red

Paint brushes- 1" wide flat brush, Fan brush, small flat brush, narrow liner brush

Glass of water

Pallet knife

Paint rag

Paint tray for mixing paint

Mix a small bit of black paint in with some white. Mix together to make a light grey color.

Set the canvas board on the easel horizontally so it is 12" tall and 16" wide.

Paint entire canvas and allow to dry for at least 30 minutes.

With black paint on your small, narrow liner brush, paint a horizontal line 4" above the bottom edge of canvas.

Using a 1" wide flat brush and dark grey paint, paint 10 or 11 buildings across the canvas at different heights.

Add a bit of white paint to the grey and add several more buildings in front of these.

Add a small bit of black paint to the grey and paint another row of shorter buildings in the front.

You want to have different shades of grey for the buildings so they don't all blend in together.

Dab a bit of grey paint on the paintbrush and very lightly, brush downward from the horizon, making a blurry reflection in the water below the buildings.

Using a wide flat brush, apply some darker grey onto the top of each building to give them a little dimension.

Take a small brush and paint a horizontal line across the top of each building to give them a flat roof line.

Here's where the fun starts!

With 7 different colors, you'll want to line them up in the order of the rainbow.

Purple, blue, turquoise, green, yellow, orange and red.

Use the fan brush for this step.

The green is in the center of the spectrum so paint the middle buildings with a bit of green at the top edge.

Then paint the blue on the left side of the canvas and the red on the right side of the canvas.

Fill in the blue and turquoise between the purple and green buildings.

Then the yellow and orange between the green and red buildings.

Add a bit of each color to the reflection in the water below the buildings.

Take your palette knife and scrape some white paint on the edge of it.

Holding the palette knife sideways, run it along the horizon line.

Get more white paint and continue to apply it to the canvas along the horizon line until it is covered.

Add some white horizontal lines below the horizon to create an illusion of movement in the water.

As you paint these lines on the water, they get farther apart near the bottom of the canvas.

I really like this technique because it adds so much depth to the painting.

At this point I stepped back and looked at the painting. I decided it needed a little more definition, so I outlined the tops of each building with black paint and a small brush.

I then added more color on top of the black allowing a sliver of the black paint to show through.

For the very last detail, I painted a bit of each color to the one next to it. This really made the colors appear to blend gradually.

I'm very happy with the way this painting turned out. Time to wash out the paintbrushes and hang it on the wall!