From the Artist: I was so excited to try this. I have been meaning to do a monochrome again, but love color so much. This painting was inspired by a recent PBS special on elephants. I felt the elephants could be any number of cool colors and used permanent blue violet and azo yellow medium. I was very concerned with too much mixing because of a muddy effect. Instead I just lightened right from the tube (on the palette of course).

I am unaccustomed to using salt to create special effects, but I think it helped on the grassy area.

From the Painting Guide: I think the salt technique has given nice texture in the foreground without distracting from the elephants themselves. Also a nice contrast to the wet-on-wet texture in the sky. Overall there's a lovely feeling of location or context, and the composition with its various horizontal bands gives a sense of the elephants walking through the landscape.

The elephants are a little silhouetted or single-tone for me, particularly if I compare them to the tree. Given the ellies are closer, would I not see some variation in tone? (You could do this by lifting off some of the color with a damp, stiff-bristle brush. Don't scrub at the color or paper, see steps 3/4 in How To Fix Mistakes in a Watercolor Painting.)

I feel the base of the tree floats somewhat, and wants a little change in the tone of the ground there to anchor it. Something to suggest a few large roots, or grass growing up against the trunk. The tree itself it beautifully painted, with a sense of volume and depth.