25 Jun Painting Outside the Box: May 11, 2013
Painting Outside the Box: Watercolors with Whimsy, with Julia Cairns!
Demo in Review
Julia Cairns put on a very informative demo, showing us how to use “negative space”, and painting “outside the box”, exploring watercolor in a whole new way. The demo was enthusiastically received. Thanks, Julia!!
Here are some Demo highlights:
I generally use a heavy, rough watercolor paper (140lbs+) and Winsor and Newton watercolor paints. Some of my most recent work is ‘multimedia’ which really means that I have used acyrilic paint as well, usually as the background, and over gesso, to give the painting more texture. There follows a description of the process involved in my paintings, I hope it gives some insight into how I work.
1. Firstly, I ‘draw’ an idea, often doing many sketches before settling on one I am happy with.
2. I then paint a ‘color rough’ which will give me more of an idea of the colors I will use. The patterns on dresses, borders etc are not set in stone at this stage and will probably change as the painting progresses.
3. The image is drawn on to the paper using a light pencil.
4. Since I use negative space a good deal, the colors underneath are important, altho’ I am never exact at this stage, eg I make sure there are a variety of greens if there is foliage in the background and various hues for other areas of the picture.
5. I then mix the colors for the background ‘negative space’ and paint around the leaves etc, allowing the wash color beneath to stand out.
6. Borders are many and various. Patterns can be painted on to the background color or another was can be applied and the pattern ‘lifted off’ with water, brush and then paper towel