Skip Lawrence
I think we'd all agree that Skip Lawrence gave his paint plenty of room to flow, allowing the colors to interact on the page. He could see that as long as he took care of the essentials there would be many opportunities to let go of control and allow the watercolor to do what it does best. Of course, this is easier said than done. How did Lawrence know what had to be done with more care? Some passages are very fluid, with soft edges running wild. Others, though, are hard-edged and quite specific. Let's just look at the buildings for a while. The artist seems to be most carefree when he is describing the large surfaces, like the main walls of the living quarters. Then, when he comes to the edges of those big shapes he takes care to show us which plane is which, especially when the shapes are silhouetted against the sky. Shape is more important than texture in this painting. Lawrence holds on to accuracy of drawing when he is describing where a vertical wall becomes a slanted roof, but he lets go of of specifics entirely when he gets to the siding on the wall or the shingles on the roof.
Look at the green apparatus in the background of this scene. Is it your job to make sure the pipes and tanks and conveyors bandleaders all connect so that they make sense? I'm more inclined to state as little as needed to just suggest that it's a busy cluster of industrial stuff.
The area around the rail car feels too busy to me. What might Skip Lawrence do?
Here's another image with similarities to that Skip Lawrence painting.
Feel free to crop these images if it helps you decide where you'll be careful and where carefree.
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