The warm
gray head appears large thanks to a sort of hidden crest, the eye is amber and
surrounded by a white ring. The throat is white. On the back the broad
red-brown margins of the dark wing feathers stand out… if I look in the field
box it seems that I have guessed the entire selection of my watercolours:
sienna and burnt umber, sepia brown, van dyck brown. Except for the white. That
is a gift of the paper if you have the patience and the foresight not to cover
it with colour. The whole scene attracts me. Those who know me know that I am
not a fan of flowers, too bold and showy, they distance me from my beloved
neutral colours. Yet the sight of that common whitethroat among the mallow
intoxicated me and I gave in. I found in my palette the permanent pink, the
manganese purple, the ultramarine violet, colours too long forgotten and I
devoted myself to them, to the flowers, with patience, glaze after glaze to
find the right colour. I made them protagonists, I searched with them for a balance
of shapes and the right connection between the whitethroat and the mallow.
She is
there in the posture I love the most, she glances at me quickly ready to resume
her migration. April is her month and the month of all those species for which
the world has no borders but only migratory routes and hospitable environments.
Happy 2025!
