Photo of the part of the board that shows the cuckoo flying downwards which I painted black, and the sky painted in shades of blue over white clouds

Reproduction of Hokusai’s ‘Cuckoo & Azalea’

Having put a coat of white paint on a couple of tall and narrow wooden boards that were framed and used to represent some ugly and soulless floral arrangements, I set to reproduce Hokusai’s ‘Cuckoo & Azalea’, which I had drawn and colored before (notably using watercolor during Drawvember 2016).

I sketched it rather precisely. We see the texture of the layer of white paint on the wood, as I used a foam paint roller:
Large white wooden board on a table next to gouache paint tubes, a brush and tiny plastic palette. A book is open at the illustration that I use as reference. A precise pencil sketch is visible on the board.

Black gouache for the strong strokes on the cuckoo, shades of blue and white gouache for the sky:
Photo of the part of the board that shows the cuckoo flying downwards which I painted black, and the sky painted in shades of blue over white clouds

Then I painted the bush of azaleas, and used some grey for the shadows on the feathers:
Board with both bird and azalea bush painted. Paint tubes are visible on the wooden table.

Finally, I used a Pentel black brushpen for the bush outline and the details of leaves and flowers:
Azalea bush now finished with outlines in black. Paint tubes are visible on the table.

Resulting 20×50 cm framed painting:
Finished piece framed.

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