So many people want to paint looser watercolours ( me included) .I have tried over the years to become more and more loose in the way I paint.Trying to exploit watercolour's properties to create wonderful effects on the page. I don't think any other medium has that sort of magic, but it's powers can be frightening, esp
Daniel Smith's from here or Amazon Schmincke from here Rivervale Handmade from here Coliro {Finetec} from Amazon
In this post I share my first impressions of Holbein Artists’ Watercolor by swatching all the colors in the 18 color set. (This post is sponsored by MisterArt.com.)
Snowdrops in Spring. Work in Progress. I am smiling as I type the above words " Work in Progress". I feel as though my life is just that. A...
Lamb coming to life in watercolour Hello! I am so excited! Actually I am excited and disappointed but I will explain why in this blog post. I have just made the toughest decision to cancel all of my upcoming art events including my demonstration and workshop at Broadway Arts Festival 2020 and I was attending Patchings Art Festival in summer. However governments all over the world are offering advise on the Corona Virus and self isolation along with social distancing seems to be a common theme. So I am really sorry for anyone that was hoping to see me in action personally this year. BUT! Here is the good news! You may not be able to attend a workshop with me but you can now see me painting live online! My new online art school is almost ready to open and in preparation there is a special offer for the opening two weeks. Please see the link below for details and add your email address where requested, if you are interested in joining my regular tutorials . You will recieve notifcation every month on two new exciting tutorials to follow and paint. Just imagine, you will be in my home with me on a regular basis and given inspiration of things to paint, techniques to try and projects to complete. Self isolation can be a good thing enabling us to create without interruption but there will be also be an online community in my new online art school where you can show your art work and meet your freinds or make new ones! Its' actually almost party time for us all! So here is the link... www.watercolourinspiration.com Add your email address and join the watercolour party! ********************
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With the weather again inclement it was decided to repeat yesterdays subject of a Flowers/Still Life arrangement. Before going any further I should have explained that the way his workshops are planned is that Charles paints, demonstrates and instructs, while Jane and Judy ensure that things run smoothly throughout the week. This isn't as straightforward as it sounds. For example the caretaker had said we must not get paint on the carpet, although there were plenty of marks on it already. This involved putting down sheets of cellophane and taping them together! For the Flower subjects they arrived with an enormous bunch of flowers, a bag of fruit and some vegetables, the flowers then split and arranged into five separate bunches. When this was being done I commented to Judy about the preponderance of white flowers. This was when she said Charles likes painting them. On this occasion he chose a different arrangement. You may note the other objects not just fruit. The duck is a regular as are some of the other items. After the usual checking and re-arranging Charles commences the drawing. Charles starts drawing with the duck. He draws the vase - inside first. Don't draw straight stems look for ovals. He said the place you start is not as good as the place you end up or vice versa. The completed drawing This was his palette for today with added paint. Compare it to yesterdays photograph. The initial application of paint which always begins in the centre by the rim of the vase. Note the Cobalt Violet. Use single strokes and keep the brush on the paper. You thus start darker and end lighter. Vary the direction of your brush strokes. When painting the bottle the brush takes different directions. The colours on it are made up, Lemon Yellow and Cobalt Blue were mentioned. It isn't always easy to follow Charles as he often improvises as the mood takes him and is certainly not regimented in any way. Things begin to take shape. Flowers are just indicated without any real detail. See how things develop. Note how the white flower is moved to just above the rim to break up the greenery. Charles always says don't overdo the leaves. The flowers are virtually finished. Not a great deal left to do. A closer look. The finished Painting. The students paint under Charles eagle eye. Following Charles demo a second critique took place in which students offered up another painting. Charles commented on each one after asking what the owner felt about it. We then broke for lunch and recommenced at 1.30.pm, everyone selecting a different arrangement to previous. I did not have a good session and scrapped the first two attempts, one at a very early stage. I'm afraid I was somewhat distracted by phone calls I'd received on Wednesday afternoon from the estate agent involved in my house selling/ buying, which is causing a lot of grief, and lost concentration. That sounds like a cop out and probably is, although the painting I did then was better than on this day. Painting carried on until 4 -5.pm with Charles supervising as you can see above. We then dispersed with the much awaited portrait session scheduled for the final day. After my poor performance so far I determined to finish on at least a higher note! One sad (but happy) note. Latifa Kostas, a Charles Reid regular for some years left at midday to return to London. We were told the following day that she now has another granddaughter! Latifa never paints between workshops as she says she is just too busy. Over the course of the week you can see how her painting improves and is much better at the end than the beginning. I noted this on previous workshops and have told her so. A salient lesson that painting regularly is essential if you really wish to progress.
Snowdrops in Spring. Work in Progress. I am smiling as I type the above words " Work in Progress". I feel as though my life is just that. A...
If you're a watercolour lover like me, you know that there's nothing quite as mesmerizing as watching vibrant colors blend and flow on paper. Naturally, the hues of watercolour paints can tend to be softer
If you're a watercolour lover like me, you know that there's nothing quite as mesmerizing as watching vibrant colors blend and flow on paper. Naturally, the hues of watercolour paints can tend to be softer
Explore Gentian O.'s 1545 photos on Flickr!
Lamb coming to life in watercolour Hello! I am so excited! Actually I am excited and disappointed but I will explain why in this blog post. I have just made the toughest decision to cancel all of my upcoming art events including my demonstration and workshop at Broadway Arts Festival 2020 and I was attending Patchings Art Festival in summer. However governments all over the world are offering advise on the Corona Virus and self isolation along with social distancing seems to be a common theme. So I am really sorry for anyone that was hoping to see me in action personally this year. BUT! Here is the good news! You may not be able to attend a workshop with me but you can now see me painting live online! My new online art school is almost ready to open and in preparation there is a special offer for the opening two weeks. Please see the link below for details and add your email address where requested, if you are interested in joining my regular tutorials . You will recieve notifcation every month on two new exciting tutorials to follow and paint. Just imagine, you will be in my home with me on a regular basis and given inspiration of things to paint, techniques to try and projects to complete. Self isolation can be a good thing enabling us to create without interruption but there will be also be an online community in my new online art school where you can show your art work and meet your freinds or make new ones! Its' actually almost party time for us all! So here is the link... www.watercolourinspiration.com Add your email address and join the watercolour party! ********************
This was my fifth Charles Reid workshop, set in the picturesque small Cotswold town of Stow - in - the Wold. Actually I wasn't over impressed with the town, as there were quite a few empty shops and in the Baptist Hall, where the workshop was held, spotted a professionally made sign advertising a `Food Bank', which apparently is held in the hall on certain dates. I have been to Stow before as I lived in Oxfordshire for many years but this was the first time I'd been there for an extended look. This workshop was different as it was not residential, Jane supplying a list of local hotels, B & Bs etc. Charles, Judy and Jane stayed at the Grapevine and so did 6 other students, the remaining 11 spread around the town.. My sister lives only 30 minutes away at Ducklington so I stayed with her and commuted daily. You do lose something by not all being together and that made a difference. Unfortunately having to book well in advance for a large group, and prohibitive insurance costs, now that Charles is a senior citizen, means that if he comes again in 2015 the same situation will prevail. Prior to Monday commencement, on Sunday a dinner was held at the Grapevine Hotel and Restaurant on the high street, a short distance from the Baptist Church. There were 18 students on the course with Jane Duke, the organizer and herself a professional artist, on hand to organize things with Judy Reid. On this workshop two thirds were first timers, which is unusual in my experience, except perhaps in Spain. Actually I've since been corrected, 10 of 18 were new, not quite two thirds. My wife and some other non-painting partners went to the dinner. DAY ONE Pt 1 Monday started with Charles demonstrating using an old black and white photograph for reference. This has become a feature of his workshops in recent years. Getting ready to start. See the reference photo or rather part of it because it included a woman on the covered right hand side. Fabriano paper. Charles started with his modified contour drawing using a continuous line and not lifting the pencil much. As you can see he divided his paper into two sections and did a second drawing in the right hand bloc, which is the one he painted. You may notice this is less detailed as it was the one intended to paint. Charles went into considerable detail for the benefit of the many `newbies'. These are most of the points he made: * When painting a person make sure they fill two thirds of the area. *Backgrounds are the hardest part of a painting. *When drawing keep hand on paper, most action will be with the elbow. *Draw light outline first then erase. *Work from the centre of the face starting with the eye or nose. *If you can't see something don't draw it. *Forget about perfection. * Take measurements using the pencil held vertically. * If in doubt make figure longer not shorter. *Keep measuring and comparing. *Don't draw long general lines - show the bumps. *Keep the pencil on the paper - short trips slow, long trips speed up. Charles used his small Sketchers box and is shown explaining to the eager throng what his 16 colours were and how they were grouped in the box. He started in the nose/eye area and you can also see some preliminary swatches at the bottom. Colours were his usual Cadmium Red, Cadmium Yellow, Raw Sienna or Yellow Ochre plus Cerulean and Cobalt Blue. Burnt Umber and Raw Umber may also have featured but I'm not certain. Here he has more or less completed the features and then down into the beard. Charles stresses placing paint rather than stroking and emphasizes the ratio of paint to water. Too many students have too much water and not enough pigment. When he paints he dips his brush in the water pot, then gives it two sharp shakes, and sometimes lightly wipes it on the small towel attached to his apron. He then goes to the paint which should be moist enough for the brush to dig into. He keeps the paint moist using a small spray bottle. Often he will then go straight to the paper without any mixing on the palette. Here again he made various points: *Mix on the paper as well as the palette. *Look for indications of lights and darks. *Make very deliberate strokes. *Soften paint edges using an almost dry brush. *Have a 50/50 ratio of hard and soft edges. Not much left to do. The finished work - actually he just decides at some point to stop rather than finish! On this workshop he was using a mixture of mainly Da Vinci Maestro 35 series and Escoda 1212 and 1214, the 1214s being retractable travel brushes. He thinks Escoda are similar quality to Da Vinci but they are generally two sizes smaller in other words an Escoda 10 is about the size of a Da Vinci 8. DAY ONE Pt 2 As the weather was quite good, with uncertainty about the remainder of the week Charles decided to paint outside in the afternoon. Students could either watch him or paint themselves. It wasn't a demonstration as such. He selected a small patch of grass with some trees and seats, just down the high street on the opposite side. He began on the left hand side by drawing the Royal Hotel (built AD947) and worked his way across the paper until he reached the edge using his contour technique. He didn't attempt to make a frame. He painted from the left hand side in a similar manner. Actually previously he has always said when outdoors draw a little then paint, draw some more then paint and so on. This time he continued until the painting was finished although he took his usual breaks, about every 20 minutes or so when he often smoked his briar pipe. As for his palette Cobalt Violet seems to now be a permanent resident and he also mentioned Cobalt Green Dark, which he said was a temporary colour he'd recently added. He does tend to experiment with one or two new colours each time I've seen him. I asked him why he had gone against his normal advice of drawing and painting in stages, the reply being `he just felt like it'! The photos of him painting are not terribly good. One major problem was that the sun was behind him and it was also slightly windy. As a result the shadows kept moving across the paper and attempts to photograph the various stages were ruined, as the camera autofocus was fooled and no one was able to produce viable photos. Those at the end were made by turning his easel around the other way out of the shadows. By then he had finished! I noticed that the painting was done like an inverted `V' with the bottom corners mostly blank. I didn't paint at all on this day but contented myself with further study of how he does things. I think that's it for day one.
Want to learn how to paint confidently with watercolours? Then click here for 6 awesome watercolour tips that will improve your skills as well as your mindset.
Louise Reynolds reviews the Holbein Artists' Watercolour Set of 30 colours, testing them for thier mixing, layering and rewetting properties.
