More experiments

Watercolour is suiting me rather well as I find that I'm all for the quick but effective in painting. I often fall into the trap of putting lots of detail in and am reminded by Susie that picture making (composition, tonal value) can be so easily forgotten - especially for large paintings. No danger with watercolour - no painting larger than A4 works for me - so many opportunities to stuff up. And you can't do too many corrections as otherwise the paper simply falls apart.


In this cliff painting I used a wax crayon to put on the whites. However I remembered the crayon only after the first wash of pale blue so the waves crashing is not dramatic enough. Susie thinks I should crop the top off and frame it. Experiment with the bottom - gouache??


This scene is of a wharf in Kiama where part of it was underwater at high tide. My interest is of the water under the wharf. Does it look convincing?


Lastly we had to paint flowers today. Susie presented a mixed bunch. There was just a riot of colour and textures. This is just a small section of the bunch - using the border technique to tie the elements together. I do like this trick - could be used on many compositions. As I'm in the gestural school of painting (except when left brain gets in the way) my flowers have little details but they seem to work.