WATERCOLOR

PAINTING

BASIC COURSE
CONTENT

• What are Watercolors? • Preparing for painting

• Watercolor history • How to mix color
• Research Artists who worked with • Exercises for color mixing
Watercolor • How to hold a brush ?
• Materials • Exercises For Mastering Brush Control
• Color Theory • Watercolor Techniques

• Tips to Remember when working with • Landscape Watercolor

Watercolor • Abstract Watercolor
• Flower Watercolor
WHAT ARE WATERCOLORS?
• Watercolor refers to both the medium and the resulting artwork.
• Watercolor (as a medium) is an artists' paint made with a water-soluble binder such as gum
arabic, and thinned with water rather than oil, giving a transparent color.
• Watercolor (as an artwok) is a Transparent painting, where the white of the paper furnishes
the lights and no white pigment is used.
• Watercolors are usually translucent, and appear luminous because the pigments are laid down
in a pure form with few fillers obscuring the pigment colors. Watercolors can also be made
opaque by adding Chinese white.
WATERCOLOR HISTORY
• Watercolor painting is extremely old, dating perhaps to the cave paintings of paleolithic
Europe, and has been used for manuscript illustration since at least Egyptian times but
especially in the European Middle Ages. However, its continuous history as an art medium
begins with the Renaissance.
• The German Northern Renaissance artist Albrecht Dürer (1471–1528), who painted several
fine botanical, wildlife, and landscape watercolors, is generally considered among the earliest
exponents of watercolor. An important school of watercolor painting in Germany was led by
Hans Bol (1534–1593) as part of the Dürer Renaissance.

cave paintings of manuscript manuscript Fine art by Albrecht

paleolithic Europe illustration of Egypt illustration of europ Dürer
WATERCOLOR HISTORY
• Despite this early start, watercolors were generally used by Baroque (1600–1750) easel
painters only for sketches, copies or cartoons (full-scale design drawings). Notable early
practitioners of watercolor painting were Van Dyck (during his stay in England), Claude
Lorrain, Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione, and many Dutch and Flemish artists.
• botanical illustration and wildlife illustration perhaps form the oldest and most important
traditions in watercolor painting. Botanical illustrations became popular during the
Renaissance, Wildlife illustration reached its peak in the 19th century with artists such as John
James Audubon, and today many naturalist field guides are still illustrated with watercolor
paintings.
• Today watercolors—with their unique ability to summarize, clarify, and
John James idealize in full color—
Audubon

are used to illustrate scientific and museum publications.

WATERCOLOR HISTORY: ENGLISH SCHOOL
• Several factors contributed to the spread of watercolor painting during the 18th century,
particularly in England.

Among the elite and aristocratic classes, watercolor painting was one of the incidental
adornments of a good education; mapmakers, military officers, and engineers used it for its
usefulness in depicting properties, terrain, fortifications, field geology, and for illustrating public
works or commissioned projects.

Watercolor artists were commonly brought with the geological or archaeological expeditions, to
document discoveries in the Mediterranean, Asia, and the New World. they churned out memento
paintings of famous sites (and sights) along the Grand Tour to Italy.
WATERCOLOR HISTORY: ENGLISH SCHOOL
• In the late 18th century, the English cleric William Gilpin wrote a series of hugely popular books
describing his picturesque journeys throughout rural England, and illustrated them with self-made
sentimentalized monochrome watercolors of river valleys, ancient castles, and abandoned churches.
This example popularized watercolors as a form of personal tourist journal.

The confluence of these cultural, engineering, scientific, tourist, and amateur interests culminated in
the celebration and promotion of watercolor as a distinctly English "national art".

William Blake published several books of hand-tinted engraved poetry, provided illustrations to
Dante's Inferno, and he also experimented with large monotype works in watercolor.

Among the many other significant watercolorists of this period were Thomas Gainsborough, John
Robert Cozens, Francis Towne, Michael Angelo Rooker, William Pars, Thomas Hearne, and John
Warwick Smith.
WATERCOLOR HISTORY: ENGLISH SCHOOL
• From the late 18th century through the 19th century, the market for printed books and domestic
art contributed substantially to the growth of the medium.

Watercolors were used as the basic document from which collectible landscape or tourist
engravings were developed, and hand-painted watercolor originals or copies of famous paintings
contributed to many upper class art portfolios.

Satirical broadsides by Thomas Rowlandson, many published by Rudolph Ackermann, were also
extremely popular.
WATERCOLOR HISTORY: ENGLISH SCHOOL
The three English artists credited with establishing watercolor as an independent, mature painting medium are:
1. Paul Sandby(1730–1809), often called the "father of the English watercolor";
2. Thomas Girtin (1775–1802), who pioneered its use for large format, romantic or picturesque landscape
painting;
3. Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775–1851), who brought watercolor painting to the highest pitch of power
and refinement, and created hundreds of superb historical, topographical, architectural, and mythological
watercolor paintings. His method of developing the watercolor painting in stages, starting with large, vague
color areas established on wet paper, then refining the image through a sequence of washes and glazes,
permitted him to produce large numbers of paintings with "workshop efficiency" and made him a
multimillionaire, partly by sales from his personal art gallery, the first of its kind.

Among the important and highly talented contemporaries of Turner and Girtin were John Varley,
John Sell Cotman, Anthony Copley Fielding, Samuel Palmer, William Havell, and Samuel Prout. The Swiss
painter Abraham-Louis-Rodolphe Ducros was also widely known for his large format, romantic paintings in
watercolor.
WATERCOLOR HISTORY: ENGLISH SCHOOL
The confluence of amateur activity, publishing markets, middle class art collecting, and 19th-century
technique led to the formation of English watercolor painting societies.
the Society of Painters in Water Colours (1804, now known as the Royal Watercolour Society) and
the New Water Colour Society (1832, now known as the Royal Institute of Painters in Water
Colours). (A Scottish Society of Painters in Water Colour was founded in 1878, now known as the
Royal Scottish Society of Painters in Watercolour.) These societies provided annual exhibitions and
buyer referrals for many artists. They also engaged in petty status rivalries and aesthetic debates,
particularly between advocates of traditional ("transparent") watercolor and the early adopters of the
denser color possible with body color or gouache ("opaque" watercolor).
• The late Georgian and Victorian periods produced the zenith of the British watercolor, among the
most impressive 19th-century works on paper, due to artists Turner, Varley, Cotman, David Cox,
Peter de Wint, William Henry Hunt, John Frederick Lewis, Myles Birket Foster, Frederick Walker
, Thomas Collier, Arthur Melville and many others. In particular, the graceful, lapidary, and
atmospheric watercolors ("genre paintings") by Richard Parkes Bonington created an international
fad for watercolor painting, especially in England and France in the 1820s.
WATERCOLOR HISTORY: ENGLISH SCHOOL
The popularity of watercolors stimulated many innovations, including heavier and more sized
wove papers, and brushes (called "pencils") manufactured expressly for watercolor.
Watercolor tutorials were first published in this period by Varley, Cox, and others, establishing
the step-by-step painting instructions that still characterize the genre today; The Elements of
Drawing, a watercolor tutorial by English art critic John Ruskin, has been out of print only once
since it was first published in 1857.
Commercial brands of watercolor were marketed and paints were packaged in metal tubes or as
dry cakes that could be "rubbed out" (dissolved) in studio porcelain or used in portable metal
paint boxes in the field. Breakthroughs in chemistry made many new pigments available,
including synthetic ultramarine blue, cobalt blue, viridian, cobalt violet, cadmium yellow,
aureolin (potassium cobaltinitrite), zinc white, and a wide range of carmine and madder lakes.
These pigments, in turn, stimulated a greater use of color with all painting media, but in English
watercolors, particularly by the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.
WATERCOLOR HISTORY: UNITED STATES SCHOOL

• Watercolor painting also became popular in the United States during the 19th century;
outstanding early practitioners included John James Audubon, as well as early
Hudson River School painters such as William H. Bartlett and George Harvey.
• By mid-century, the influence of John Ruskin led to increasing interest in watercolors,
particularly the use of a detailed "Ruskinian" style by such artists as John W. Hill Henry,
William Trost Richards, Roderick Newman, and Fidelia Bridges.
• The American Society of Painters in Watercolor (now the American Watercolor Society) was
founded in 1866.
• Late-19th-century American exponents of the medium included Thomas Moran,
Thomas Eakins, John LaFarge, John Singer Sargent, Childe Hassam, and, preeminently,
Winslow Homer.
WATERCOLOR HISTORY: EUROPE SCHOOL
• Watercolor was less popular in Continental Europe. In the 18th century, gouache was an
important medium for the Italian artists.
• In the 19th century, the influence of the English school helped popularize "transparent"
watercolor in France, and it became an important medium for Eugène Delacroix,
François Marius Granet, Henri-Joseph Harpignies, and the satirist Honoré Daumier. Other
European painters who worked frequently in watercolor were Adolph Menzel in Germany and
Stanisław Masłowski in Poland.
• Unfortunately, the careless and excessive adoption of brightly colored, petroleum-derived
aniline dyes (and pigments compounded from them), which all fade rapidly on exposure to
light, and the efforts to properly conserve the twenty thousand J. M. W. Turner paintings
inherited by the British Museum in 1857, led to an examination and negative reevaluation of
the permanence of pigments in watercolor. This caused a sharp decline in their status and
market value. Nevertheless, isolated practitioners continued to prefer and develop the medium
into the 20th century. Gorgeous landscape and maritime watercolors were done by Paul Signac,
and Paul Cézanne developed a watercolor painting style consisting entirely of overlapping
small glazes of pure color.
WATERCOLOR HISTORY: 20TH AND 21ST CENTURIES

• Among the many 20th-century artists who produced important works in watercolor, Wassily Kandinsky, Emil Nolde,
Paul Klee, Egon Schiele, and Raoul Dufy must be mentioned.
• In America, the major exponents included Charles Burchfield, Edward Hopper, Georgia O'Keeffe, Charles Demuth, and
John Marin.
• In this period, American watercolor painting often imitated European Impressionism and Post-Impressionism, but significant
individualism flourished in "regional" styles of watercolor painting from the 1920s to 1940s. In particular, the "
Cleveland School" or "Ohio School" of painters centered around the Cleveland Museum of Art, and the California Scene
painters were often associated with Hollywood animation studios or the Chouinard Art Institute (now
California Institute of the Arts). The California painters exploited their state's varied geography, Mediterranean climate, and "
automobility" to reinvigorate the outdoor or "plein air" tradition. The most influential among them were Phil Dike,
Millard Sheets, Rex Brandt, Dong Kingman, and Milford Zornes. The California Water Color Society, founded in 1921 and
later renamed the National Watercolor Society, sponsored important exhibitions of their work.
Although the rise of abstract expressionism, and the trivializing influence of amateur painters and advertising- or workshop-
influenced painting styles, led to a temporary decline in the popularity of watercolor painting after c. 1950, watercolors continue
to be utilized by artists like Martha Burchfield, Joseph Raffael, Andrew Wyeth, Philip Pearlstein, Eric Fischl, Gerhard Richter,
Anselm Kiefer, and Francesco Clemente. In Spain, Ceferí Olivé created an innovative style followed by his students, such as
Rafael Alonso López-Montero and Francesc Torné Gavaldà. In Mexico, the major exponents are Ignacio Barrios,
Edgardo Coghlan, Ángel Mauro, Vicente Mendiola, and Pastor Velázquez. In the Canary Islands, where this pictorial technique
has many followers, there are stand-out artists such as Francisco Bonnín Guerín, José Comas Quesada, and Alberto Manrique.
WATERCOLOR HISTORY
• In East Asia, watercolor painting with inks is referred to as brush painting or scroll painting. In
Chinese, Korean and Japanese painting it has been the dominant medium, often in
monochrome black or browns.
• India, Ethiopia and other countries have long watercolor painting traditions as well.
RESEARCH ARTISTS WHO WORKED WITH WATERCOLOR

• Albrecht Durer, Hare, 1502

• William Blake, The Ancient of Days, 1794
• JMW Turner, A Fire at the Tower of London, 1841
• Thoman Moran, Castle Geyser, Upper Geyser Basin, 1871
• James McNeill Whistler, Chelsea Children, 1880s
• Paul Klee, Red and White Domes, 1914
• Georgia O’Keefe, Evening Star IV, 1917
• Edward Hopper
• Winslow Homer
• John Singer Sargent
• Jamie Wyeth
• Sukran Moral
• Larry Bell
• Don Bachardy
• Cecily Brown, Untitled (Paradise) , 2014
• Nadine Faraj, Too Wonderful, 2014
MATERIALS: PAINT
• Watercolors appear more vivid than acrylics or oils because the pigments are laid down in a more pure form with
fewer fillers (such as kaolin) obscuring the pigment colors.
• Terms:
Transparent: can be seen through- allows the penetration of light
Opaque: cannot be seen through- prohibits the penetration of light
• "Transparent" colors do not have titanium dioxide or most of the earth pigments, which are very opaque.
• Modern commercial watercolor paints:
available in two forms:
– Pan colors: pigments are often inferior, less intense (just dyes)
– Tube colors: preferable, more versatile, more intense, more permanent
come in two grades: "Artist" and "Student.”
• Watercolor in tubes is not meant to be used without water. You need a TINY amount (like the size of a ladybug or
smaller) of each color you’re using. Think of what’s in the tube as the pigment, and when it is mixed with water,
that becomes your paint.
• More water equals lighter values/colors. DO NOT lighten with white. This will make your work look “muddy” or
“chalky.” (I also don’t like to use too much black. I think it gets too heavy in a watercolor painting. I only use it if I
absolutely cannot use another color. I like to use the pthalo blue for shading).
MATERIALS: PAINT
• Four components of Watercolor paints:
1. Pigments.
2. A binder that holds the pigment in suspension and fixes the pigment to the painting surface (usually gum arabic)
3. Additives like glycerin, ox gall, honey, preservatives: to alter the viscosity, hiding, durability or color of the pigment and vehicle mixture
4. Solvent, the substance used to thin or dilute the paint for application and that evaporates when the paint hardens or dries
• Watercolor Paints Pigment Sources:
– Inorganic:
Synthetic mineral- chemical
Natural mineral- “earth colors”
– Organic:
Animal
Vegetable
Synthetic organic colors
• Watercolor Paints Pigment Types:
– Opaque
– Transparent
– Staining (light)
– Non-staining (heavy)
MATERIALS: PAINT
• Granulation Theory of Watercolor:
Stain: fine particles, sink slowly because they are light enough to stay suspended or float- they spread or diffuse- they will
penetrate into pores of paper- create permanent stain – Ex. Thalo Colors
Semi-Staining: go down less slowly- particles are less fine so they do not penetrate as rapidly into pores of paper
 Non-Staining: particles are heavy and sink faster because they are larger they do not penetrate pores of paper
• Granulation is created by a combination of thick (heavy) with a thin (light) Pigment
– Light pigment will diffuse on the damp paper creating a “halo” stain around the heavier pigment
– Pigments separate on the paper and to not stay well-blended
Ex. Thalo Blue and Burnt Sienna, or Thalo Green and Vermillion
• Transparent Pigments:
Stains Light Pigments: – Sap green – Brown madder – Rose madder – Alizarin crimson – New gamboge yellow – Sepia
Semi-Stains Heavy Pigments: – Hooker’s green(light and dark values) – Anthwerp blue – Payne’s Gray – Aureolin yellow –
Lemon yellow – Yellow ochre – Burnt Sienna
• Opaque Pigments:
Semi-Staining Light Pigments: – Cadmium red – Cadmium orange – Cadmium yellow – Raw sienna – Naples yellow – Indian
red – Windsor emerald – Cadmium scarlet
Non-staining Heavy Pigments: – Vermillion – Manganese blue – Ultramarine blue – Cobalt blue – Cerulin blue – Chromium
oxide green – Chinese white – Ivory black
MATERIALS: PAINT
• How to Buy the Right Watercolor paints?
 Select a set of watercolor paints. 12-color set is a great deal. Most sets have a good selection of
basic colors you’ll need for transparent watercolor painting.
If you prefer tubes pre-packaged tube sets will also give you a good starter selection of colors
for watercolor painting. Start by using brand name “academic” or “student” grade watercolors
until you can commit your resources to buying “artist” grade watercolor supplies.
I suggest the following palette of colors for beginners:
This selection is a bright balanced palette of warm and cool colors
containing pure transparent and semi-transparent organic and
inorganic pigments.
You’ll fill in the gaps and find your own favorites as you try new colors and explore watercolor
painting.
MATERIALS: PAINT
• MANUFACTURERS CODES USED IN COLOR LIST

• TUBE AND PAN SIZES

Being as there is no real set standard for tube sizes they can vary in size from 5 ml up to 37 ml and more. Liquid watercolors also
have a wide range of product sizes and strengths. I’ve always looked at them as small (5-8ml) and large (10-15ml) and “Should I be
painting more?” (21ml and larger)
Brands and General Sizes: Blockx 15ml; DaVinci 37ml; Grumbacher 7.5ml; Holbein 15ml-#5; Rowney 15ml; Rembrandt (Talens)
5ml; Schmincke Horadam 5ml-#2, 15ml-#6; Sennelier 10ml; Van Gogh 10ml; Winsor & Newton Cotman 8ml, 21ml; Winsor &
Newton Artist’s 5ml-#2, 14ml-#5;
Approximate Pan Weights and Sizes:
Half Pan: 1.5ml – 1/2″ x 5/8″ x 1/4″
Full Pan: 3ml-4ml – 1″ x 5/8″ x 1/4″
MATERIALS: BRUSH
The Brush Types of Brushes:
• Rounds: round cross section with a tapering profile, widest near the ferrule (the "belly") and tapered at the tip (the
"point"). These are general purpose brushes.
• Flats: a flat wedge; the tuft appears square when viewed from the side and has a perfectly straight edge.
• Filbert: A hybrid brush: a flat that comes to a point, like a round, useful for specially shaped brush strokes.
• Fan: A small flat in which the tuft is splayed into a fan shape; used for texturing or painting irregular, parallel hatching
lines.
A brush consists of three parts:
1. Tuft: a bundle of animal hairs or synthetic fibers tied tightly together at the base.
2. Ferrule: the metal sleeve surrounding the tuft, gives the tuft its cross sectional
shape, provides mechanical support under pressure, and protects from water
wearing down the glue joint between the trimmed, flat base of the tuft and the
handle.
3. The handle: typically shorter in a watercolor brush than in an oil painting brush,
has a distinct shape—widest just behind the ferrule and tapering to the tip. Painters
typically hold the brush just behind the ferrule for the smoothest brushstroke
MATERIALS: BRUSH
• Brushes tuft:
1. Bristle: stiff, hog’s hair, “boar”
2. Nylon: plastic, synthetic
3. Hair:
– Red sable: the best, actually made from hair of the Kolinsky or Tartar Martin from Siberia
– Sabeline: dyed ox hair
– Camel: squirrel hair
• Sizes of Brushes:
Round Brushes- “0000” smallest, 12 is usually largest available
Flats and Brights- ¼ smallest, 1 usually largest (occasionally up to 2)
MATERIALS: BRUSH
WATERCOLOR BRUSH CARE :
• Do not let the paint dry in your brushes.
• Keep your brushes clean and dry between painting sessions.
• Store upright in jars only when dry.
• Use your watercolor brushes only for watercolor and gouache paintings.
• Use a synthetic sable or frisket tool to apply liquid frisket.
MATERIALS: PAPER
• The traditional and most common support—material to which the paint is applied—for watercolor paintings is paper. Other supports include papyrus, bark papers, plastics, vellum
, leather, fabric, wood and canvas. Watercolor paper is often made entirely or partially with cotton, which gives a good texture and minimizes distortion when wet.
• Paper Basic properties:
– Rag: ph balanced, long lasting, highest quality, often hand made
– Sulfite: wood pulp, non ph balance leading to decomposition, yellowing, brittleness, much less expensive, machine made
• There are three primary components which impact the look and feel of watercolor paper:
1. How the paper is treated, (surface)
2. 2. The weight of the paper,
3. 3. How the paper is processed after manufacture.
• Weight of Paper Determined by “ream weight” or weight of 500 sheets of that paper in standard size
– Ex. 350 lb. paper means that 500 sheets of that paper weigh 350 lbs
– Standard weighs run 80 to 400 pounds
– In watercolor, it is considered best to stretch all but heaviest papers of the aquarium papers
– Paper is sized with glue which is usually removed by moistening when watercolor painting. Blotters are made from unsized paper
MATERIALS: PAPER
• How to Buy the Right Watercolor paper?
Use any watercolor pad, block, or loose paper with a weight of #140 or higher. The heavier the
paper, the less likely you’ll have to deal with the warpage of the damp paper while painting. I
recommend larger sheets like this one because you can always cut them in half or quarters for
smaller paintings.
You can even find servicable beginner’s watercolor pad (for learning).
Try different surface textures to find your favorite.
There are two main grades of watercolor paper: artists' quality and students' quality. Artists'
quality, known as archival paper, is acid-free and designed to endure. Papers that aren't acid-
free will become yellow and brittle over time. If you're practicing, students' quality paper is
fine but the paint won't perform as well and don't expect your painting to stand up to the test of
time.
MATERIALS: WATER
• Find a glass, or jar, or small bucket to hold fresh, clean water. Use two if possible. One for
rinsing your brush between colors, and one for clean water for painting.
• Tap water is usually fine. Hard water decreases paint solubility and flow. Overly softened water
acts as a wetting agent and increase paint solubility and flow. If you’re concerned, use bottled
water.
COLOR THEORY: THE COLOR WHEEL

• The 12-part Color wheel is a representation of the visual spectrum of

light that us humans can actually see. The visible spectrum
(traditional ROYGBIV) is a very small range of the whole
electromagnetic spectrum that runs from radio waves on the long end
to Gamma waves on the short end. Each color has a specific wave
frequency that our eyes perceive as different color sensations.
• The basic color groupings that concern artists are the Primary colors
(3), the Secondary colors (3), and the Tertiary colors (6).
• Terms:
Hue refers to the color name, as in red, blue, and yellow are different
hues.
Color saturation is to the strength of color as it is presented.
Chroma is the amount of grayness in a color, achieved by adding
white or black.
Value refers to a color’s lightness or darkness on a gray scale of 1 to
10.
COLOR THEORY
• PRIMARY COLORS :Red, Yellow and Blue
Lightwaves travel at different frequencies: Red is longest,
Yellow is middle range, Blue is close to the short end
(Violet)

• SECONDARY COLORS: Orange, Green and Violet

Combining Primary Colors in pairs results in Secondary
Colors. (Yellow + Red = Orange, Yellow + Blue = Green,
Red + Blue = Violet)

• TERTIARY COLORS: Filling in the Gaps

The colors that fall between the Primary and Secondary
Color mixtures are Yellow-orange, Red-orange, Yellow-
green, Blue-green, Red-violet and Blue-violet.
COLOR THEORY
• COMPLEMENTARY COLORS: Colors that are 180° opposite
each each other on the Color Wheel. Complementary colors
afford the highest possible color contrast and stability.
• MIXING COMPLEMENTARY COLORS :If you slowly mix a
color into it’s complementary color it gradually loses it
vibrancy and it’s identity as a color. They neutralize each other
and leave a variation of gray.
• SPLIT COMPLEMENTARIES: Indirect complementaries
Split complementary groupings have a color and the two colors
adjacent to that colors complement. Example: Yellow/Red
Violet/Blue Violet.
COLOR THEORY
• ANALAGOUS COLORS: Color Neighborhoods
Groupings of 3 or 4 adjacent colors on the color wheel. Here are four groups of three analagous
colors.
COLOR THEORY: COLOR AND EMOTIONAL TEMPERATURE

• Primary Colors – Red, Yellow, Blue

Red is the color of blood and living things, it is warm. Yellow is the color of the sun and warm gold flowers.
Blue is the color of coolness and water and distant skies.
• Secondary Colors – Orange, Green, Violet
Orange is the color of citrus on warm trees and the last warm rays touching the edges of a distant canyon.
Green can be vital and growing or distant and alien. Violet can be rich with a neutral demanding presence or
find itself in flashes of organic mischief.
• Tertiary Colors – Yellow-orange, Red-orange, Red-violet, Blue-violet, Blue-green, Yellow-green
Yellow-orange is a flash of flesh and life. Red-Orange is a shouting invitation to celebrate it’s presence. Red-
violet is the shadows of sandstone canyons at dusk not yet cool. Blue-violet is a mystery with deepening
shadows holding the night’s chill. Blue-green is a cooling insistence that promises comfort in another place.
• OUR EMOTIONAL RESPONSE TO COLOR
All the impressions I free-associated above, when taken as a whole, will give you a vague idea of a basic color
theory concerning our emotional response to colors and how those responses actually relate to the visual reality
we find ourselves in. As well as inferring some hard-wired primal response to color that we’ll never likely get a
handle on.
TIPS TO REMEMBER WHEN WORKING WITH WATERCOLOR

• Know your medium and the effect you want to achieve – wet v. dry.
• Work from light to dark, build up value over layers Build up color in layers.
• Have plenty of paper towels on hand Can work like a kneaded eraser to lift up areas of wash or to correct mistakes.
• If you’re using the splatter technique, work neatly and don’t go overboard, Hold your paintbrush between your thumb and middle
fingers. Using your index finger, pull back on the bristles and let them snap forward.
• Move around the paper – don’t work next to an area that’s still wet or your colours will bleed.
• Paint the essential, paint broadly, paint details last
• A nice thing about watercolor is that you usually don’t have to put out more paint each session! Once you have prepared your palette,
the colors can still be used, even if they’re dry (just put water on your brush and rub it on the dried pigment). The only time you will
need to put out more color is if you run out of if you need an especially vibrant color.
• What not to do…
Muddy colors- created by mixing or over- layering heavy opaque color.
Balloons- hard edges created by uneven drying (use a hairdryer!) Overworking
• Sequences of Painting:
– Paint center of interest first, progress to least important last (difficult to do in watercolor)
– Dark to Light: lay in darks first to achieve unity quickly, dangerous but effective
– Light to Dark: lay in light values first, progress to darkest last, a safe conventional approach
PREPARING FOR PAINTING
PREPARING FOR PAINTING
PREPARING FOR PAINTING
HOW TO MIX COLOR
• Step One: To start your puddle of color, take your clean watercolor brush and touch the bottom
of your clean water container. This will open up the brush hairs to the ferrule. Take your fully
loaded brush, and either thump it a couple of times in your mixing well to release the water, or
slide the brush against the rim of your mixing well to release the water.
• Step Two: Stroke your wet brush across the top of your first pigment. Bring your watercolor
brush back to your puddle of water and mix the two together. Do not rinse out your brush. Just
slide your brush against the rim of your mixing well once.
• Step Three: Stroke your watercolor brush across the second pigment. Bring your brush back to
the puddle, and mix the new pigment with the first.
• Step Four: Continue adding brush strokes of the new pigment to your original color, until you
get the color and value, you are trying to achieve.
EXERCISES FOR COLOR MIXING
• Create a color wheel that includes the primary, secondary and tertiary colors.
• Create a color mixing chart. Paint parallel, vertical stripes using each color in your palette.
When these are dry, create the same pattern in horizontal rows.
• Create a graded wash.
• Create a flat wash.
• Create a variegated wash using the wet-on-wet technique.
• Create two experimental washes using salt and plastic bags.
HOW TO HOLD A BRUSH ?
1. THE CLASSIC:
• The Classic grip for holding a watercolor brush is much like the way you hold a pen or pencil for writing. The only difference being that you (for the
most part) are gripping the brush further from the business end of things.
Pick up your brush and grip the thickest part of the handle above the ferrulle—the body of the brush—and hold it like you are getting ready to write a
letter. Remember writing?
Weigh the brush in your hand, roll it with your fingers, find the balance of the brush in your grip.
Your control for the Classic grip starts from the simple actions of the arms and wrist to the fine control of the fingers.
• The Classic grip gives you linear control, making it ideal for flowing lines and drawing with paint.
Crosshatching, creating value with thin overlapping strokes, is best handled using the fine control this grip offers.
Pointillism, the dot by dot laying in of color or texture can be easily done holding your brush this way.
• Practice signing your name in a way that you can use to sign your paintings.
HOW TO HOLD A BRUSH ?
2. THE PINCH
• Hold your brush like you are picking up a pencil from a table, pinching it between your thumb and fingers.
As you run through this exercise you can loosen the grip to allow the brush some travel, but only use your fingertips to hold the brush when painting.
You can use 2 to 4 fingertips to hold your brush.
• Practice:
Position your brush parallel with your paper, loosen your wrist and start seeing what strokes you can make as you hover over the paper.
You won’t have much control, but in some artistic situations that may be exactly what you need.
Notice the brush’s resistance to upward, pushed strokes and the ease of pulling strokes toward you, or downward.
Most of the control is in your arm, wrist, and fingertips. Vertical strokes are easiest to pull but erratic to control in width.
The wash of the stroke may be broken because you cannot apply the same pressure to the brush as you can with other grips.
This same lack of pressure gives a unique texture when you move the brush side to side across your paper.
Note that the arc of your horizontal strokes is controlled almost entirely by your arm.
HOW TO HOLD A BRUSH ?
3. PASS THE PENCIL
• Hold your brush like you are passing someone a pencil as in “here ya go…” But keep the brush in your hand, you’ll need it.
This is a looser grip than the Pinch with pressure from your thumb holding the body of the brush against your index and middle finger. Your ring finger and pinkie will wrap
loosely and sort of serve as rudders.
Held loosely, the brush gives you more control in getting your intent on paper.
• Practice:
Rest your knuckles on your paper and using wrist motion scrape the edge of your brush against the paper.
Alter your brush position and the angle of your wrist as you try different strokes.
Try to paint some detailed or linear stokes with this grip. (Good luck)
Rolling your brush between your thumb and fingers as you paint makes for interesting textural effects.
Most of the fine control in this grip in in your fingertips and wrist. You have more control that the Pinch grip. Just in a different way.
• If you feel up to exploring a little impressionism, this brush grip would be one to keep in mind.
HOW TO HOLD A BRUSH ?
• 4. THE SCREWDRIVER
• Hold your brush like a screwdriver. It’s an awkward way to hold a brush at first, especially for painting watercolors.
First, the limited range of control forces simplicity.
Secondly, holding your watercolor brush in this manner gives access to broad “sketching” or “painterly” strokes.
Thirdly, if your fingers shake or you have arthritis, you might consider altering your style by altering the way you work your tools.
• Instead of a “controlled” approach to painting with the Classic grip, the Screwdriver grip forces a different “attack” of paint to paper. I would call it an organic and expressive way to paint.
• Notice the tight grip of the ring and pinkie finger, as well as the other digits.
• Roll your wrist while you let the side of the brush roll across the paper for some interesting texture.
• Useful for blocking in large, loose masses of paint in your paintings. Or as a complete technique in itself.
• The motor control for this grip is shifted to your whole arm and is therefore limited. Your fingers are busy gripping the brush, so they act with the wrist.
• You’ll be suprised by how much control you DO have and the action of painting while holding your brush this way is as aggressively artistic as it gets.
• Useful for quick expressive watercolor sketching en plein air or studio. Slapping and daubbing paint, and making grand curves are fun to do with this grip.
• Try it with a large flat watercolor brush.
HOW TO HOLD A BRUSH ?
5. THE CONDUCTOR
• Grip your brush by the tip of the taper of the brush handle, like you’re a conductor about to tap the music stand to make the orchestra come to attention.
• Using the weight of the brush and the new “feel” explore the looseness and painterly aspects of your brush.
• You’ll notice this is a variation of the Pass the Pencil grip, using a loose grip so finger manipulation is possible.
• The variation of paint stroke quality in this grip is more a distortion of the brush end being further away from your fingers, and the balance of the weight of the brush in your fingertips.
• This is another very interactive technique. You have to actively watch the way your brush is moving across the paper.
• While you are interacting with your brush, your brush will often interact back. You have to learn the feel of the snap of the brush head as paint is whipping around when you paint,
grasshopper.
• Using this grip your whole arm down to your fingertips is involved in a balancing act with a wobbly brush than often has a mind of it’s own.
• Fluid yet thoughtful work is possible, letting you explore paint and form in a loose manner.
• A good technique for watercolor sketching outdoors when working in fleeting conditions.
• It’s also just plain fun to paint this way sometimes, it’s great for exploring ideas.
HOW TO HOLD A BRUSH ?
6. THE SUMI-E (KINGMAN)
• While researching the life of Dong Kingman I noticed a variation in his brush grip peculiar to those trained in Chinese calligraphy and sumi-e style painting.
• The original Chinese writing system was in the form of pictograms, tiny little abbreviated images of people and things called the hànzi characters. They are composed of thick and thin
stylized lines that a brush makes.
Western cultures have long depended on pens and pencils for handwriting and drawing, but the handwriting of many eastern cultures is based on the brush and ink.
• A stick with a singular point, i.e. a pencil or pen, requires you to apply pressure as you write and so demands a strong grip, so when we grab a brush we invariably go for the “Classic”
grip. Just like we were getting ready to draw.
• In fact, early European watercolors were called watercolor drawings with washes tinting a drawing base.
The classic grip works fine for the most part but it also requires more effort and has less range of motion and expression than the sumi-e lock.
• By shifting your brush position from the top of your index finger to the bottom of your index finger (see example) your grip becomes less severe, allowing controlled fluid movement.
• I noticed Mr. Kingman often held his brush this way when “writing” his figures, birds and other expressive details in his famous works.
• The 1954 James Wong Howe film Dong Kingman has many scenes of the artist at work en plein air as well as working at home in his studio.
• Try this grip when painting small areas and details like figures, birds, or architectural elements in your painting. You will get more range of movement and “snap” to your brushwork.
EXERCISES FOR MASTERING BRUSH CONTROL
1. BANDS OF COLOR

• This exercise is designed to hone your wash laying skills in the form of single strokes of color laid down side by side in whatever pattern your first stroke takes. The object is to concentrate on the white line you are forming
between each stroke. Try not to touch any previous strokes, keep the white lines of unpainted paper unbroken.

• Mix several puddles of different colors on your watercolor palette. I used a round #10 red sable for most of this exercise. A round #4 red sable was used to add smaller variations in the gaps.

• A larger brush that holds more paint will allow you to make longer continuous brush strokes.

• Fully load or “charge” your watercolor brush with paint and starting at an edge of your paper, start painting a winding line of paint across the page.

• Keep the width of the brush stroke as consistent as you can. You can recharge your brush as needed and pick up where you left off.

• While the last stroke is still wet, rinse out your brush and grab the next color.

• Start pulling another linear stroke next to last one painted. Follow parallel with the previous stroke as it snakes across your page.

• Do not let the washes touch. Leave white paper between each stroke.

• This is the time to be daring…try to get as close as you can to the previous stroke. How thin can that white stripe get?

• Repeat as necessary with different colors until you’ve filled the paper, then rinse.

• This exercise requires a certain steadiness of hand to do without letting the washes touch as you maneuver across your paper.

• This is the hunting ground of the “happy accident” where an unintended painting event dictates your next move aesthetically.

• I think I scored about 92%. Close enough for rock’n’roll.

EXERCISES FOR MASTERING BRUSH CONTROL
2. THICK ‘N’ THIN
• Artists add interest and variety by altering the thickness in a single stroke of a flowing paint. By using the tip of your brush you can get a fine line flowing. If you add pressure as you pull the
stroke the brush spreads and the stroke thickens. If you lessen pressure the stroke will get thinner. This exercise combines this brush skill with a twist on the band of color exercise.
• Start by pre-mixing several puddles of different colors, basic primary colors are fine.
• Make sure your brush is full but not sopping wet. Work the tip on a clean area of your palette until it comes to a satisfactory point.
• Starting at the edge of your paper gently pull a fine line with the tip. Start to apply pressure to the brush to thicken the stroke.
• Then lessen the pressure until the line thins out again. Continue this thick’n’thin stroke across the page.

• Rinse your brush and change colors. Start a new thick’n’thin stroke next to the last one.
• You can try to thicken your stroke where the adjacent line is thin, but in particluar, avoid touching the other washes with the new colors you lay down.
• If your brush starts to runs dry, reload your brush from your palette and continue the stroke where you left off.
• You will notice that different pigments and brands of watercolor paint have different “flow” characteristics as you practice.
• This exercise will help you learn to develop more expressive lines through brush and wash control.
• Being able to instinctively thicken or thin a brush stroke on command while you are painting, and have it go where you want it, is a good thing. It is a learnable skill as you will see.
• I used a round #10 red sable for most of this exercise, while using a round #4 red sable for smaller fill-in strokes.
EXERCISES FOR MASTERING BRUSH CONTROL
•
3. WRIST FLICK
• The Wrist Flick is a playful stroke that can be easily overdone. And it is sometimes overdone because the artist just couldn’t get that last branch or blade of grass to lay
the way they wanted. So they try again. As an alternative to screwing up an otherwise decent painting I suggest practicing and exploring this technique so you know how
to do it when you need it. Screwing up while practicing is O.K. Just try some more until you’re comfortable with it.
• Start by preparing a few colors to work with on your palette. Mix up some medium value washes in several colors.
• The Wrist Flick is easily done with a decent round red sable or a rigger-style brush.
• Load your brush with paint and angle the tip of the brush towards you as pictured. This is the starting position for the Wrist Flick.
• This is the ending position of the brush stroke. Pivoting from your wrist push the brush tip up and away in a “flicking” motion.
• The last part of the stroke flicks out in a feathery point. Practice several times in each color you have.
• Vary the thickness of the strokes as you try to imitate grasses, branches, or even feathers.
I rested my brush hand on top of my other hand for some of the brush strokes here. Try this technique for stability and control of detailed flick strokes.
• Continue practicing the stroke on your paper. You don’t have to paint a scene like this one, but be aware that one may grow naturally as you practice.
• Along with suggesting grasses, branches, and feathers effortlessly, the Wrist Flick and variants are handy when rendering hair in portraiture or wildlife painting.
• A little Wrist Flicking can go a long way to finishing off a landscape painting. Too much can do a painting in before you know you’ve gone too far.
EXERCISES FOR MASTERING BRUSH CONTROL
•
4. PAINTERLY STROKES
• The feel of a fully loaded watercolor brush slapping on the paper can be exciting and scary at the same instant. Being free with your brushwork and paint can be a bit intimidating at first, but it is a lot of fun.
You can see the brush shape in strokes made with this brush technique. Generally speaking any painting done in a loose and free technique would be considered a “Painterly” painting.
• Mix up some watercolor paint on your palette in several colors that may work well together.
• In this exercise I used an old #12 Serie 7 Winsor & Newton round red sable. Not much of a tip left but it can hold a good amount of paint and still controls well for this technique. A #7 round red sable brush
was used for a few smaller strokes.
• Start by laying the full brush on the paper and lifting away cleanly. That is the shape of your brush fully charged.
• Try more short dabbing strokes across your paper.
• Rinse your brush and change colors.
• Experiment with some longer sweeping strokes. Keep your brush strokes uniform in width as you start to overlap strokes to develop shapes.
• Play with different groupings of brush strokes across your paper.
• Rinse your brush and change colors. Continue laying down similar brush strokes trying different angles of attack.
• Allow your wet brush strokes to intermingle as you progress.
• This “full brush” painterly stroke lends itself easily to landscape and watercolor gesture sketching.
• This brush stroke is only one of many that are considered “painterly” in quality. It is loosely based on the watercolors of Frank Wilcox, Frederick Childe Hassam, Maurice Prendergast, and Edward Hopper.
• Variations of painterly styles can be found in works as diverse as those of Charles Demuth, Paul Cezanne, Dong Kingman, Georgia O’Keefe, Andrew Wyeth, and John Singer Sargent, among many others.
EXERCISES FOR MASTERING BRUSH CONTROL
5. THE STAB
• In the approaches to getting paint to paper interestingly with watercolor brushes this one can make your brush cringe. Sometimes you have to use your brush in ugly ways to get beautiful texture. You will
muscle through different ways of scumbling, and pushing paint as you splay the hairs of your brush in an un-nice manner. Only press to the heel of the brush hairs, don’t let the ferrulle mar the paper surface.
• Start by pre-mixing puddles of color on your palette. Due to the graphic nature of this approach (no pun intended) you may want to use an old brush to practice this technique.
• Load your brush with color and take a gentle “stab” at the paper. Watch your brush and notice the fanning pattern of the hairs as you push it into the paper.
• Although it looks otherwise, this is not a violent stroke. You have no intent but to find some new technique.
• Notice the steeper angle of attack.
• Continue poking around on your paper, adding a twist or spin to your stroke by rolling your brush in your fingers as you paint.
• Experiment with angles of attack to find the best spreading point for the brush you are using.
• Consciously try to shape the hairs as you press a stroke into the paper. Give it a little wiggle while the brush hairs rest on the paper to make them align.
• Try a slow motion stroke—tipping your brush so the pressure point is on the tips of the hairs. This presses more paint into your paper, making a more defined stroke.
• Rinse and switch colors and/or brushes. Continue to practice spreading and twisting your brush, building texture across the paper.
• Look for organic shapes and textures as you allow your strokes and colors to overlap and blend.
This is another example of a what is considered a painterly stroke.
• The “Stab” technique works best in conjunction with other brush strokes unless all you need is texture for your painting.
• Be kind to your brush afterward.
EXERCISES FOR MASTERING BRUSH CONTROL
6. CUTTING EDGES
• This exercise utilizes your skills in drawing and your brush control in painting edges of washes in various shapes. Use geometric shapes in a variety of sizes, and colors using the largest brush
possible for each size. You have to know how to paint the shapes you see before you. Since we all know how a circle, square, triangle, rectangle, or star, looks you’ll know immediately if you’ve
succeeded. Painting shapes requires the use of several brush techniques you can develop simply by practicing them. I did.
• Start by mixing up several pools of primary colors to work with.
• For the larger shapes I’m using a round #8 Grumbacher Watercolor Classic red sable brush. I added smaller shapes with a round #4 Kolonok 1001 Series Kolinsky sable.
• From my experience “cutting an edge” is a sign painter’s term for pulling a clean line of paint with your brush. A clean line being a line that is smooth and flowing with no irregularities.
• Notice the twisting motion controlling the upstroke of the circle shape.
• Consider each shape before you start to paint. What is the minimum amount of brush strokes needed to create the edge of the shape?
• A circle? One or two strokes. Triangle? Three. Square. Uh, four. You get the idea. The five-pointed stars were done several ways. I cut both edges of each arm on some (ten strokes), tried five
thick’n’thin strokes, and drew a star doodle: one stroke, five intersecting lines.
• If your brush is too full to get a proper point, touch it on a sponge, tissue, or towel to remove excess paint before you start.
• While you have one color in your brush try painting all the different shapes across the page in that one color. Rinse your brush out, switch colors, and repeat.
• For sharp corners use the very tip of your brush and start the brush stroke at the corner point of the shape.
• For circular shapes, start your curving brush stroke inside the edge of the shape and pull the stroke into position before continuing the stroke.
• Switch to a smaller brush and try some mini shapes. Happy painting!
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Flat Wash: applying pre-mixed, even value color to wet or dry ground.
• wet surface - there are many degrees of dampness, but an area freshly soaked with clear water
will float the pigment and allow it to move freely over the ground; use brush soaked with water
and paint. Watercolor Techniques
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Graded Wash: applying color over a wet or dry ground where a change in value or color or
both takes place.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Polychromatic Wash: flat or graded wash in more than one color; prepare color puddles
before beginning wash technique.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Glazing: Glazes are easy to accomplish using a little patience between steps. You must let each
wash dry completely before applying the next transparent layer of pigment.
• Glazing is much like wet on dry technique, but you are creating layers of transparent color. You
allow one layer of watercolor to dry before applying additional transparent layers of color.
Effect give a dept to the object and value ranges you normally not achieve by one layer of
paint.
• Layering your colors will allow for richer and deeper colors and textures in your painting.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Wet-in-wet: a process of adding paint into a wet area that already has been pre-wet with clean
water.
• Wet on Wet When you saturate the paper with water then apply the watercolor paint. Or you
can add watercolor paint onto a wet area of watercolor which has already been painted. Effect
is a bleeding, blending or flared look to the watercolors/colors.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Wet Over Dry Wash: a process of adding paint into a dry area that may or may not have
already been painted a dried. This allows for layering of colors.
• Appling a wet layer of water color onto a dry paper or a dry section of painted watercolor.
Layers of paint are generally washes of color or more watery applications of paint. The effect is
you can see through the layers if you do layer colors and the edges of the brush stokes are crisp
not soften.
• Notice the different between wet & dry grounds below.

wet dry
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Pointillism: Pointillism: A technique of painting in which small, distinct dots of color are
applied in patterns to form an image. No background color should be showing.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Dry Brush: Brush loaded with paint onto dry paper.
• Dry Brush Using a brush that is moist but not wet and picking up watercolor paint and then
brushing it over the paper in one direction to create a broken brush stroke. You are able to see
the white of the paper or the color underneath.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Masking: Cover areas to preserve the white of the paper. You can use tape or masking fluid
(rubber cement).
• Masking is using either a liquid, tape, or stencil to block paint from covering a specific area on
the canvas. Effect leave the white of the canvas or wash color visible after a painting has been
completed over the masked area. Masks are removed after the desired result is met.
• Masking Use of mediums to protect or mask your paper from watercolor: Rubber cement,
Crayons, Masking fluids.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Lifting: Removing paint from the paper using a sponge, paper towel, or rag.

• For more interesting effects – you can use your finger!

WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Plastic Wrap: Plastic wrap is applied to wet paint and then removed after drying to create a
textured look.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Tissue Paper: is applied to wet paint and then removed to create a textured look. Similar to
plastic wrap.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Scratching / Scraping / Sgraffito Wet: Scratch into wet paper to create texture.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Wax Resist: Wax is applied to areas you want the watercolor pigment to repel the surface.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Splattering: The flicking of paint onto the paper.
• Splatter Technique Using a paintbrush or tooth brush to create splatter patterns on the canvases.
The artist will tap the brush against ones hand, or run a finger over a load toothbrush with paint
which creates a spray effect. The effect is irregular smattering of paint droplets or a spray
pattern.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Stamping: Dabbing the paint onto the paper with a sponge/rag/stamp.
• Using various size sponges or one size to add paint or remove paint from a canvas. Effect is an
irregular pattern that is great for texture, leaves, folage, and rough surfaces.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Salt: Apply salt to wet paint areas of painting to create a speckled texture.
• Salt Technique by adding the salt to the paint while it is very wet, the salt will absorb the water
and leave behind a crystalized texture
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Alcohol: Drops of alcohol added to wet paint dries quicker than the surrounding paint to create
a unique texture.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Lift off: Using an absorbent material such as, tissue, paper towels, or a sponge to blot or pick
up paint that may or may not be wanted. Effect is you can create details with this method or
lighten colors or reduce values.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• UnderPainting: Roughing in the values of a composition before color is added.
• Generally this is done with Gray or Ocher color paint.
• Effect is you build up your values to help create depth and greater value strength in the
composition.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Wash: A overall application of watery watercolor either on a wetted canvas or dry to create an
even or uneven range of color. This can be used in big or small areas. Depending on the
purpose.
WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUES
• Line and Wash: First the composition is drawn using a permanent not bleeding black
marker/pen. Then thin/transparent washes of watercolor are applied over that drawing to
enhance the composition.
LANDSCAPE WATERCOLOR
• The big idea: Create a 2 dimensional painting that gives the illusion of space through the use of
atmospheric perspective and overlapping objects, understands basic compositional rules such
as the rule of thirds, learns to apply beginning watercolor techniques, and color theory to create
a unified painting.
• Technical grid: Vinegar Credit card swipe
Flat wash Pushing out pigment Water color pencil with
Graded wash Lifting off sandpaper on wet paint

Glazing Detail painting Burlap

Wet on wet Hard and soft edges Sponging

Wet blend Opaque/transparent Alcohol on lid

Dry brush Salt Plastic wrap

Stippling Water blooms Splatter

Negative painting Wet and dry scratch Masking tape/fluid

LANDSCAPE WATERCOLOR

• The process:
1. Find reference:
LANDSCAPE WATERCOLOR

• The process:
2. Create outline:
Get smaller as they recede into the distance
Simplify shapes
Make at least 6-8 shapes
Shapes should overlap
LANDSCAPE WATERCOLOR

• The process:
3. Create thumbnail:
 to create thumbnail version of your reference, you should think of composition first.
The word composition means combining or putting together parts to form a whole.
Composition can apply to many works of human endeavor including music and writing – in
fact anything that is arranged or ‘put together’ using conscious thought.
 let’s talk about the most important rule of composition called, The Rule of Thirds.
 The Rule of Thirds: Divide the image into thirds as shown – If the main visual components
(things in the image) lie on or near the lines then the image often tends to look ‘right’. In this
image the horizon line is on one of the bisectors.
LANDSCAPE WATERCOLOR

• The process:
4. Color plan test:
LANDSCAPE WATERCOLOR

• The process:
5. Technical test:
 LANDSCAPE WATERCOLOR

• The process:
Example:

Reference Thumbnail Color plan test Technical test Final painting

ABSTRACT WATERCOLOR
• Like Richard Serra once said: ‘Drawing is a verb.’
• On the wall, it’s hard to see BOOM-BURG as an inanimate object. It still seems like it’s doing
something. Lines stretch. Lines bend. Lines flow and converge. Together, they make the wall
vibrate, to appear as a space one can move in to, not just along-side of. - Emily Sall
• Abstract Expressionism a development of abstract art that originated in New York in the 1940s
and 1950s and aimed at subjective emotional expression with particular emphasis on the
creative spontaneous act (e.g., action painting). Leading figures were Jackson Pollock and
Willem de Kooning.
ABSTRACT WATERCOLOR
• Exercise: Make an abstract watercolor artwork that shows a verb or phrase.
Pick a Richard Serra phrase or verb. (more than one to have options)
Sketch ideas?
Or just start painting with verbs in mind.
Objective: You will use knowledge of compositional strategies in order make an abstract
watercolor that demonstrates a verb or phrase.
• DRILL:
1.Get a cup of water, brush for watercolor, and newspaper square for drying brush.
2.We will look at a few ideas for showing action or concepts in abstract painting.
3.Goal: To pick one or more of Richard Serra’s phrases or verbs and attempt to make an artwork
that shows that word.
4. What could this artwork express? Maybe a mood or an action or idea?
FLOWERS WATERCOLOR
1. Start with a photograph.
2. Draw the photo onto the watercolor paper using a grid.
FLOWERS WATERCOLOR
3. Start by using a 1" flat brush to paint a wash of clear water over the entire paper, being sure to
paint around the basic flower shapes. Into the wet paper work a mixture of Yellow and Green
paint.
While the first wash is still wet flow in darker tones- Dark Green and Blues.
FLOWERS WATERCOLOR
4. After the background wash is dry use small washes of yellowish brown to indicate the
browning portions of the irises.
Then begin adding some darks to the foliage with a mixture of Dark Green and Blue.
FLOWERS WATERCOLOR
5. Underpaint some of the petals in pure Rose. Be sure to use clear water and soften any edges
that are not sharp before your wash dries.
Underpainting-is painting a color under
FLOWERS WATERCOLOR
6. Using Blue with a touch of Purple paint the basic shadows of each flower. Pay close attention
to the original photo to get the correct shapes and combination of soft and hard edges.
Then use Purple to start adding the shadows on the red petals.
FLOWERS WATERCOLOR
7. For the background use a dark mixture of blue and darkest green and brown to indicate a deep
shadow area behind the entire group of flowers and foliage.
These two colors can give you deep dark blues, rich greens and warm dark browns as you mix
them in different quantities.
FLOWERS WATERCOLOR
8. Final detailing on each flower was done with darker Purples, Rose, and Blues. Use the point of
a #6 brush to add veining and texture to each flower.