This is an example of glazing, not in watercolor, but in acrylics...I started with laying out the simple shapes in the LIGHTEST value ....pale browns, olive greens, pale reds, etc. , and to keep it simple (I was on a tight budget and of course, needed it done yesterday), I used a MEDIUM value next of all the colors, and then used the darkest and most intense values (sparingly) last. The reason I bring this up in a watercolor class is that IT'S EXACTLY THE SAME STEPS I USE IN TRANSPARENT WATERCOLOR....with the exception, as you can see....where I used an opaque blue white for the fish and the guy's shirt (as a little dash of seasoning on a beige background) This is one of a series I did for Tommy Bahama's flagship store in Vegas.
It's acrylic paint on Roclon canvas that has been primed with beige gesso. My first layer of paint was the glazed "bloom" of orange for the background, and then I went from light to dark in my values of paint.
Here's the black and white version, so you can see the value change.
So many people tell me they hate acrylics because the medium is "garish". It's not, if you glaze, and make your colors your own...cool down that shrieking green with a little red, chill out a magenta with a little ochre, and GLAZE a complimentary transparent green over that shocking orange.
OK. Next week please bring a tube of Lunar Black from Daniel Smith. If you can't make the trip, let me know and I can either pick up one for you or make arrangements with another student to get a tube. You can also share!Yep. You guessed it. The next lesson is about VALUE. Don't miss it! And I must say, I was so proud of the way you toiled away at your apple rendering in the last class. Most of you got it by the end of the lesson, and I have to tell you I was thrilled. I promise, after the next "basic" class, we are going to get a little more wild and crazy, and your lovely individual style will find more expression.
Water color Lesson #2, Fall 2009
2 .Watercolor Class, Fall C and P Contour drawing. Using only secondary and tertiary colors. Fruit and and fish. Warm and cool colors. Structure.
Look at leaves! Color samples...warm or cool...guess what combination of primaries. Secondaries or tertiaries?
1. Contour drawing....mountain ash, boston ivy. Why? It centers you and slows you down.....gives you focus and a quiet meditation. SLOW....find an edge and start SLOWLY...back up on shared edges, don’t lift from paper...turn away from.paper. This is an exercise in looking that happens to use the physical skill of drawing. Focus entirely on the object you are drawing....let the world and your internal “edit” fall away. (ten minutes)
2. The difference between Hansa yellow and A. yellow, Manganese ,pthalo, and cobalt, alizarin crimson, cadmium red and earth red. Notice degrees of staining, granulation and opaque quality.
Mix some secondary and tertiary colors in your pallatte wells. Make them fairly intense.
On two small pieces of watercolor paper...Draw very lightly (1) Three apples (1) three fish.
Notice the structure of the fruit and the fish.....this is what drawing can show you. Put a pale wash of yellow on all six shapes. Work quickly.
On the second and third apple and and the second and third fish drop in while still wet, secondary colors and tertiary colors. Let dry.
Show how to make shadows of cobalt and umber (or manganese and umber) (I don’t like stains for shadows.)
Put shadows to the side of the apples.
Glaze some stain color patterns (dots, stripes, zig zags )on your fish.
Use red and green (which is what primaries?!!) (mix each with a bit with a complement) to do the curving stripes on your apple and mix a brown from red and green for stems.
When fish are dry, try wetting all of # 2 fish and using a blue/umber wash on the bottom to show shadow. Then use Lunar black for shading on the last fish. (with a light hand!)
Assignment. Reread 1-15 in Jan Hart’s book.
On a quarter sized paper, lightly draw arrangement of five fish of different sizes and shapes and angles, or 3 fruit and branches, leaves or vines. Spend only 20 minutes sketching out your arrangement. Think of the negative space. Don’t get too complicated. Use large size or group shapes for a focal point. Start light, paint shapes with water, then add a pale wash and then let colors bleed into the shapes. Work from top to bottom. Use some of the cobalt/raw umber or lunar black to show modeling or shadows.
Using a cool color to create modeling....letting a blue "bleed" into a wet warm colored shape to create a shadow below.
Or, using Lunar black to create shadows or modeling....paint area with clear water and then paint with a glaze of lunar black, letting the granulated black pigment "fade" out as it approaches where the light hits the form.
As you work with the paints, I think you realize that the blog entries, while giving you some information and also as a definite reinforcement for what you did in class, are not a real substitute for being in class. It's a commitment, and I know how our lives are so tangled up with other people and other promises, so the combination of the blog, your efforts and all my support will contribute your feeling of success in this class. I just hope you will end up loving painting as I do.
Last, but not least, I want to emphasize that I am NOT teaching you splinter skills! You can use the concept of glazing with watercolor, wash drawings, acrylics and oils. When I was taking lessons on trompe l'oeil (fool the eye) painting and my still life looked too "jumpy" or full of unrelated objects, a GLAZE (over dry paint with oils) of raw sienna, dioxide purple, cad red, or hookers green...(lightly, lightly!) made everything unified...until I punched a bunch of stuff up and had to glaze it again!
If you have a chance to go to the Vancouver show of Dutch painters, take a look at Rembrandt's lace collars and cuffs...he calmed down that blinding flake white with a swish of umber glaze that puddled deliciously in the impasto valleys.
I'm no Rembrandt, but I was amazed at how a glaze could calm down a rowdy bunch of grapes or day glow oysters! (you should have seen my lobster before I washed him down with a tint of purple)
©Jennifer M. Carrasco 9/17/09 All blog entries on this site, visual or intellectual, are the property of Jennifer M. Carrasco (unless stated otherwise) and cannot be reproduced or used without her written permission.
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