Watercolor Painting: A Comprehensive Approach to Mastering the Medium (2 page)

With opaque paint each stroke can be experimental, applied with a let’s-see-if-
this
-works attitude. If it’s no good, you can scrape it off and try something else. Watercolor artists, on the other hand, have to apply the paint like they really mean it. No wonder it scares us away. Remember, though, that the oil painter and the acrylic artist did not get it right on the first try, either. Underneath the finished painting there are probably six or seven false starts. The only difference is that when watercolorists start over they have to reach for another piece of paper. So be it. Get used to using lots of paper, and while you’re at it, make it
good
paper. You will have much better results on the real stuff.

Throughout this book a strong emphasis is placed on how to learn from your mistakes. The assumption, of course, is that mistakes will be made. Seeing failures as opportunities is a necessary first step toward rapid progress. As soon as you understand a problem in terms of the basic watercolor variables, you are halfway to a solution, but you can’t move forward without sticking your neck out.

The key to taking the fear out of watercolor painting lies in knowing, within an acceptable range, what will happen when the brush touches the paper. The wider you can make that range of acceptable results, the more carefree your application of the stroke can be. While it is true that there are moments when sheer luck saves the day, more often a boldly applied, telling brushstroke is the result of considerable practice and thought.

The good news is that all this work need not be done every time you make a new painting. Some of it sticks, and eventually it becomes second nature. For instance, compressing the value range, as was done in the image opposite, helps keep the background where it belongs. After a few successes with that particular strategy it becomes part of your repertoire.

Add up enough experiences like this and soon many of your decisions are already made
before
your brush meets the paper. An experienced painter at work may appear to be reckless, but his progress is actually a series of choices based on years of thoughtful practice.

The feeling that brilliant watercolors should spring from a fountain of divine inspiration is a fallacy that leads to frustration. A virtuoso musician still needs to practice scales every day. Moments of total luck do happen, but it isn’t wise to count on them.
Carefree
is not the same as
careless.

The paintings I admire most have left room for the paint to assert its fluid nature, which means that the artist was not controlling every millimeter of its movement. Instead, when an artist makes conscious decisions
in advance,
he is much more likely to create an informed stroke, one that does not need correcting. A thoughtful approach leads to confident paint application, which in turn leads to that characteristic watercolor look of ease and spontaneity.

While we are painting we must juggle countless possibilities, including which brush to use, the direction of the strokes, the saturation of the paint, its color, the softness of the edges, whether to make a subject a single shape or a collection of individual marks, and so on. The list may seem endless, but, in fact, it can be condensed into a manageable set of four basic variables: value, wetness, color, and composition. Most of the choices you make will fit into one or another of these four categories. With such a short list, you can realistically consider your options one variable at a time. Watercolor does not have to be either uptight and overly controlled or fluid and formless. It really is possible to make conscious choices about how to use the fundamental watercolor tools without sacrificing the juiciness of the medium.

JOSEFIA LEMON,
MORNING LIGHT IN CAMERRAY,
2010
WATERCOLOR ON PAPER
11¾ × 14½ INCHES (30 × 37 CM)

As we step from foreground to middle ground to background, the distance between the darkest dark and the lightest light (in other words, the range of values used) decreases, resulting in an illusion of vast space.

TOM HOFFMANN,
JIMMY’S BACKYARD,
2007
WATERCOLOR ON ARCHES HOT PRESS PAPER
15 × 20 INCHES (38 × 51 CM)

In this cityscape the four main variables—value, wetness, color, and composition—have been manipulated to keep the background and middle ground separate.

Consider the space in
Jimmy’s Backyard,
left. The background is a jumble of shapes that could easily have intruded on the middle ground. We can go down the list to see what was done, variable by variable, to keep that area back where it belongs.

There are many fine books that emphasize the technical skills required for making watercolor “behave.” The focus in this book is on
awareness
rather than technique. It is important to know
how
to make a warm, neutral, graded wash, but it takes a different set of skills to know
when
that particular technique is called for.

When you set up your gear in front of a new subject, how do you know what to do first? Should you start with the foreground and work your way back? Or maybe do the opposite? Should you start with the most attractive part of the scene—the aspect that drew you there in the first place? But how will you know how much emphasis it should have until the rest of the image is in place? With so many possible ways to go, and that pricey piece of spotless white paper staring you in the face, it can be tempting to just take a nap.

Translating an image or a scene into the language of watercolor need not be a hit-or-miss process. Remembering a few clear steps before you begin
painting helps reveal the fundamental structure of the image and allows you to keep a good grip on what must remain true no matter where your individual style takes you.

To help discover what needs to be in the painting and what can be omitted, emphasis in this book is placed on the logic of proceeding from
general to specific, and the benefit of seeing in layers. A brick wall, for example, is first of all a red rectangle. Once this fundamental reality is established you have the means for deciding how much of the more specific information that you can perceive—the individual bricks—needs to be added. The big shapes that make up the overall image can be represented in their simplest, most general form as a first layer. Texture and detail represent complexity that is appropriately added in subsequent layers.

When we see someone working with real confidence, whether an artist or an athlete, we often say that they “make it look easy.” In fact, when all of the questions that attend each stroke have been answered in advance, it
is
easy. The hard part is remembering to ask those questions.

Toward that end, this book presents a series of questions to keep in mind for each of the following elements of watercolor painting:

Learning to make informed decisions will have a profound effect on your painting practice. It will not, however, take all the risk out of working with watercolor. Wet paint will always involve an element of surprise, and that’s the good news. As your awareness skills and your technique develop, you will find that you can let go more and more of control and specificity, allowing the paint to have its way. And, increasingly, what the paint does after you have made your choices will be just right. I think of this process as “broadening your standards,” where the definition of
perfect
becomes more flexible as you develop your partnership with the paint.

TOM HOFFMANN,
WATMOUGH HEAD,
2011
WATERCOLOR ON ARCHES HOT PRESS PAPER
15 × 11 INCHES (38 × 28 CM)

At three thirty on a midsummer afternoon the powerful pattern of light and dark on the face of this rock has an almost physical impact. It seemed fitting to let go of specific information and keep the brushwork simple, so the image could be taken in at a single glance.

LARS LERIN,
OPERA,
2010
WATERCOLOR ON PAPER
50 × 54⅜ INCHES (127 × 138 CM)

Lars Lerin’s interpretation of an opera house brims with the feeling of grandeur and opulence. Ironically, he achieves this richness by deliberately limiting most of the major watercolor variables: the composition is simply symmetrical, the palette is limited to three colors, and almost all of the edges between shapes are hard. In the realm of value, however, the artist pulls out all the stops. Never merely black, his deepest darks remain full of color. He limits the lightest lights to just a few spots, making everything else seem to be lit by the low gleam of a lantern in a gilded cavern.