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"Financial"   -   Grant Street, San Francisco

Grant Street in San Franciso is the main street of Chinatown. On a day that I was sketching and shooting both the financial district and Chinatown, I ended up with overlapping sketches which influenced this painting. The background is Grant Street, but the main subjects were from the financial district.

The financial district of San Francisco is certainly interesting on a weekday. As I looked around at all of the people carrying briefcases and going about their business, I was reminded of the Simon and Garfunkel song - America:

Laughing on the bus
Playing games with the faces
She said the man in the gabardine suit was a spy
I said be careful his bowtie is really a camera

It was my inspiration for this painting. From left to right: the woman in black with the black briefcase turns to look at the woman in orange who also has a briefcase (as well as being the main subject in the painting). The couple in jacket and jeans look left and right as he reaches into his pocket for?

A man with a cane brushes by another man leaning against the lamppost. The primary focus has plenty of wrinkles to contemplate. The man to her left is reaching for? The woman in blue stuffs a secret document. Finally at far right, two men sneak into an alley.

Below is the final painting in high resolution as well as low resolution.

Above left, high resolution                 Above right, low resolution

There is a lot more detail in the woman in orange than I originally planned. She is literally drenched in the sunlight of a bright day. When I tried toning her down, the couple on the curb became the focal interest. I did tone down her briefcase to allow it to become an entrance to the painting and not an exit.

Click on the picture below to see the large size

Above left, high resolution                 Above right, low resolution

Below - Red in face is complemented by the green railing reflection. Orange is complemented by the blues.

Above left, high resolution                 Above right, low resolution

Below - There really is not that much detail up close.

The key to making the face jump out is in the dark/light as well as color contrast

Above left, high resolution                 Above right, low resolution

Below - The oranges of the main subject are also represented in the background.

Above left, high resolution                 Above right, low resolution

Below - In this close-up, you can see all of the reds, greens, oranges, blues, yellows, and purples in the background building facades. They mix to produce an optical illusion of grays when you stand back to view the painting.

Above left, high resolution                 Above right, low resolution

Below - Initially, I used complementary colors for the streets and sidewalks,

but later added more oranges on top to further tie in the main subject.

Above left, high resolution                 Above right, low resolution

Below - Can you spot the changes from the version below to the final painting?

This was actually within weeks of the final version, but there were still fairly major modifications.

The entire background was painted over with palette knives as well as brushes,

HER briefcase was white originally, then light blue, dark blue here, and finally black.

Above left, high resolution                 Above right, low resolution

My major battle was with the people not fitting in the background properly.

There was enough detail in the people but I had removed too much from the buildings in order to fade them back.

I finally decided to give equal contrast to everything in the painting to achieve a more interesting composition.

Below - This greyscale version shows the foreground and background contrasts in comparison.

I started this painting in 1988 and finished in 2012.