View of Malakoff Hauts de Seine

Light comes from the left-front, creating warm shadows on the building fronts against a heavy, overcast purple-gray sky that dominates the upper third. The eye travels along the street receding into depth, anchored by the tall telephone poles with their thin wires cutting across the composition. The foreground is split between a pale yellow street on the left and an orange-terracotta plowed field on the right—both flattened and geometric. Dense, simplified green tree masses fill the middle ground like solid blocks, while small silhouetted figures scattered along the street establish scale and draw us down the perspective line.

The darkest darks cluster in the telephone poles, building chimneys, the lamp post, and small figures—these act as focal anchors. The lightest lights are the cream-white building facades and the pale foreground pavement. The sky is a unified mid-dark gray-purple with little modulation. A clear squint reveals three distinct zones: dark poles and figures, mid-tone trees and building shadows, and light buildings and street. This simple three-value grouping is crucial to the naive charm.

• #3e3d38

  Ivory black + burnt sienna

  Telephone poles, building chimneys, lamp post, figure silhouettes

• #554e46

  Raw umber + burnt sienna

  Building shadows, darker building tones, pole shadows

• #776a5a

  Raw sienna + ultramarine blue

  Terracotta plowed field in foreground right

• #8d818e

  Yellow ochre + white + touch of ultramarine

  Cream-colored building facades, pale foreground street

• #6a5248

  Ultramarine blue + burnt sienna + white

  Sky, muted purple-gray tone throughout upper half

• #a19b84

  Yellow ochre + white + raw umber

  Light ground areas, building highlights, pavement midtones

All edges are clean and defined—buildings have sharp corners, trees are rendered as solid geometric blocks with minimal internal detail, and the telephone wires are crisp lines. Brushwork is notably flat and simplified, without texture or expressive handling. Surfaces feel painted in solid, single passes rather than layered—this graphic clarity is essential to the naive aesthetic and must be preserved rather than softened.

1. 01

   Establish structure and horizon

   Lightly block in the horizon line roughly one-third down from the top. Sketch the street edges receding to a vanishing point, the placement of the three buildings (one left, two right-center), and the vertical poles. Use this geometric skeleton to anchor everything—the perspective is strictly linear and simple, so get this right first.

2. 02

   Lay in the sky mass

   Cover the upper half to two-thirds with muted purple-gray. Keep it flat and unified—this sky has almost no modulation or weather effects. The tone should feel heavy and overcast. Use your large brush and let this dry before adding elements that sit in front of it.

3. 03

   Block major value zones

   Establish the three-value structure: paint the buildings cream-white, the trees as solid dark green, and the foreground street as pale yellow. Don't worry about details yet—treat each building as a single flat plane, each tree mass as one shape. This gives you the overall value read.

4. 04

   Paint the foreground ground plane

   Divide the foreground: the left street stays pale yellow-tan, the right side becomes the terracotta plowed field with its distinctive geometric brick pattern. Keep the field texture simple—it's a flat terracotta base with a grid of thin darker lines suggesting tilled rows, not complex brushwork.

5. 05

   Refine buildings and add window details

   Now add the small dark windows and doors to each building—they're simple rectangular shapes. Add subtle shadows on the building walls where the roof overhangs, using a slightly darker cream tone. The buildings' geometric simplicity is their strength; keep corners clean and avoid rounding edges.

6. 06

   Paint telephone poles and wires

   Use a thin, stiff brush to draw the dark brown poles as crisp vertical lines. Then add the thin wires strung between them using a very fine line—these create the rhythm and perspective recession of the piece. Make sure the poles recede properly in perspective; they should converge slightly toward the vanishing point.

7. 07

   Add figures and lamp post

   Paint the small dark silhouetted figures on the street—keep them very simplified, almost like paper cutouts with minimal detail. Add the dark lamp post on the left side. These small elements ground the viewer's eye and create scale; they're deliberately toy-like and flat.

8. 08

   Refine edges and unify values

   Step back and check that edges are clean and crisp throughout. Sharpen any soft edges between the sky and buildings, ground and buildings. Make sure the value contrast between the dark poles/figures and the light buildings is maintained. The naive style depends on graphic clarity, not atmospheric softness.

• Over-modeling the buildings with shading and highlights—they should remain flat, simplified planes with just one shadow tone to suggest depth.
• Making the trees too detailed or textured; they are solid, geometric masses of green, not individual foliage rendered realistically.
• Softening edges or adding atmospheric perspective that contradicts the naive, graphic style—keep everything sharply defined.
• Rendering the figures with too much detail or anatomy; they're simplified silhouettes, almost iconic rather than naturalistic.
• Making the sky varied or dramatic; it's a unified, flat purple-gray that feels heavy and oppressive without clouds or visible brushwork.
• Mishandling the perspective of the telephone poles and wires—they're critical to the composition's recession and must converge properly toward the vanishing point.

beginner friendliness

value contrast

palette complexity

compositional simplicity

brushwork visibility