Bayeux - the old town

During our short vacation in Normandy (France) we visited the town of Bayeux, mostly because our vacation home was very close to that medieval town.
We did go to see the Tapestry and the Cathedral and walked back to our car by the river Aure that flows through the town. There are two watermills in Bayeux that are still working.

We did have many nice views during our walk in Bayeux, but this one inspired me to paint.
It is quite a change after what I painted before, to do a scene with all those roofs and buildings, but I wanted to paint the colours of the houses we saw in that part of Normandy.

The roofs of the buildings in Bayeux are grey, the colour of slate. The buildings are made with a yellow stone. Even the cathedral has these colours and in the villages we passed we also saw that this stone was used for houses and farms. 

While I was painting this scene I thought I made a wrong choice more than once, because this was not easy. Mostly because the scene is not what I usually paint and also a bit because I was not having ideal painting conditions like I have in my little studio at home. 
In short, this was a fight - with myself, the paper, the paint, the subject, etc.
When I was about to give up, my husband said the painting is nice and I should have a rest and a cup of coffee. That helped.

This watercolour painting is not about the architecture of Old Bayeux, but about how it feels to walk there between those yellow stone buildings by the river Aure and I think I managed to paint that - even though it was not easy to do so.

The details about paper and paint, size, availability etc. can be found at my website www.jannekesatelier.webs.com