A New Tree April 21, 2008
Posted by Enas Yorl in Art.Tags: Trees, Watercolor
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Getting better.
This is starting to get more in the direction of the stuff I have been trying to do. The ground is a LOT better than the other one and the overall feel too. I still don’t have the proper stroke / texture for the tree. The instructor had to help me quite a bit with that advisewise*. I like the way the roots turned out and they are almost exactly what I had in mind from the start. I’m going to use that again.
I had some problems with the paper that really hampered me this time though. These days I’m in the habit of trying out my strokes and color selections on another piece of paper before executing on the painting itself. As noted in the Tech Specs below this is Arches paper. It’s one of the more expensive brands out there and it’s the one that a LOT of professonals use. My test paper is the less expensive Canson brand, but the Arches paper simply didn’t perform as well! It fuzzed up really bad when I went in to lay fine texture lines on areas that had a base color. The Canson never did that. Hmmm. There might be a problem with the latex masking fluid I’m using. I’m going to do some tests.
One of the other “advanced”** students is an older lady and she routinely uncorks some amazing paintings full of big, bold colors and are done with real painterly skill. She works almost exclusively in the full sheet (22 x 30 inch) sizes on 300 lb paper (unstretched). She’s also an old hand at painting with oils so she’s got a lot of experience that translates well. Anyway, she made an off-hand remark about how the other one in our little group of repeat students uses small brushes on big paintings that struck me. I do the same thing, and now I think that may be a big part of my problem. I keep using fiddly little brushes when I should be laying in with the big guns to put down the big, bold strokes that can be filled in / modified later.
Technical Specs:
Image size: 9.5 x 13.5 inches
Paper: Arches 140 lb cold pressed
Colors: Phthalo Blue, Burnt Sienna, Payne’s Grey, Violet, & Sepia
Notes: The paper was pre-stretched with tape on a pine board.
*The Instructor will often paint directly on a student’s work to show her how she can improve the painting / technique and whatnot***. He used to do it with me too, but now he doesn’t at all.
**Use of sneer quotes around “advanced” refers to me - not her.
***The vast majority of people who take this class are women for some reason.
I have *never* done a decent painting on expensive watercolor paper. That’s not just performance anxiety because I know the stuff costs $10 a sheet, or whatever. It’s the sizing.
The cheaper the watercolor paper, the more sizing it has — the glue coating that makes it less absorbent. Paper in its natural state is like toilet paper — you couldn’t possibly paint on it. The sizing makes it less so.
Well, really expensive paper like Arches has just enough sizing to keep the paint from spreading. Me, I think the result is dull and flat and lifeless. Also, you can’t correct AT ALL, because paint soaks into the paper and by-god stays there.
You can tell how heavily sized a paper is by putting a blob of color on it and letting it dry. If it dries with a dark, hard, crisp edge, it’s heavily sized. Or you could let it dry and re-wet it. If you can pick up the paint easily, it’s heavily sized.
So, what to do? You don’t want to spend a lot of time painting on cheap crappy paper, right? My best alternative is a really heavy, high rag content Bristol board. It’s smoother than watercolor paper, but I kind of like that. If you find one that’s sized just how you like it, buy a shit-load.
Interesting. Thanks for the input Ms. Weasel. Still, people are able to do good works on this stuff. I know - I’ve seen it!
The next project is going to be on the Arches 300 lb paper I stretched on my new frame. This stuff is cut from an actual whole sheet, the other came off a pad.
I asked you below, but you might not have seen it - have you tried Clayboard?
the vast majority of people who take this class are women for some reason.
Good thinking, Enas. Uh, I mean . . . how serendipitous!
Meh. Not being able to access your comments from work is a pain.
I had to look that up. No, I’ve never used clayboard. I made real gesso panels once…with the rabbitskin glue and the slaked plaster and everything. GEEZ! What a pain in the tail. It was kind of fun to paint on, but way not worth it.
Wow. That’s hard core old school right there. You might want to check out the clayboard textured (smooth is too smooth for watercolor I think). I’ve been meaning to do more with it, but then I’ve been meaning to do more of…everything.
I used to be a huge art geek. There’s a shock, huh? Combed old libraries looking for the Secret of the Old Masters.
I finally found it, too: they were really talented and they worked really hard.
HA! Very true.
Niiiiice!
I haven’t zoomed back to old posts, figuring you’d just slap a new post up to show updates. Very nice tree - the painting looks “solid”, don’t know a good way to put that.
Why do I picture it screaming “STELLLLAAAAAA!”?