- A. C. Leighton
A daily practice of sketching and painting gives you a chance to exercise the big three P's - practice, practice, practice!
Wet-on-wet mountain landscape - watercolour on Bockingford 300gsm - 12" x 8" - Maree©
For this wet-on-wet scene, after wetting the paper, I sketched the main outlines of my scene using my Rigger and Cerulean Blue, a "trick" I picked up at my watercolour workshop on Wednesday. I'm sure many of you use this technique (I know West Coast artist Marie Theron does), but I've always been somewhat of a sketchy person, using my pencil, going into great detail with a lot of erasing happening. It's only been the past couple of months since I started practicing painting with no sketching beforehand that I feel confident enough to consider doing this.
The other day I was reading the article "When can you call yourself an Artist?" -
- and yesterday morning I felt like an artist! Standing in front of the easel, arm outstretched with the Rigger, creating a beautiful masterpiece!
I didn't use any reference material either, just my imagination.
By the way, to answer the question above, I think the best reply was as follows :
“You are an artist when you make art. Many artists spend their lives not selling their work … One of the first requirements for an artist is to ignore those who would define whether they are artists. The only real measure is the person making the art or, if need be, posterity.” -- Jon
A lovely watercolour, Maree. Full of atmosphere! I personally draw in a watery navy blue first. In watercolour it is mixed from raw umber and ultramarine. With acrylics Prussian blue on its own is fine. I can see that cerulean is a good choice because it immediately sets the summery mood.
ReplyDeleteThank you Marie. And I know you draw with the navy, thought about it just after I posted this and meant to come back and put in, "I know artist Marie Theron does", then clean forgot about it! Think I'll still add it anyway.
ReplyDeleteI have heard of many artists who use this method! I haven't tried it yet as I like to go in with out a preliminary sketch. The aim is to use a pigment which can be washed out if needs be, but strong enough to see. The colours Marie mentioned are perfect for watercolours!
ReplyDeleteLove this painting Maree!
Thanks Debbie. I personally don't see the difference as to whether one uses paint for the outline or a pencil - I naturally prefer the pencil, but it was a good exercise of control, because you can't rub out the paint! But there again, one can work the paint outline into the painting.
ReplyDeleteHi Maree - just spent ages going through all your marvellous paintings and memories! Like the new look blog - the background colour shows up your work beautifully.
ReplyDeleteHi Liz, thanks for the new look comment - was just waiting for someone to complain as I wasn't quite sure about it!
ReplyDeleteI love the way you have used colour in this painting. It's beautiful.
ReplyDeleteThank you very much Sandra!
ReplyDelete