(5x7)Jean had a post a few days ago listing her favorite watercolor instruction books, which made me think of a book I have had for a couple of years and enjoy looking at, Gail Speckmann's Wet-in-Wet Watercolor.
Jean's also been showing some lovely wet-in-wet painting on her blog, which inspired me to give it a try.
I don't think of myself as a very controlled (or controlling?) painter. When I take classes there are inevitably people who fixate on details or who become frustrated that the paint does things they don't want or expect (whereas I'm counting on it!). I'm past that stage (at long last) but still not evolved enough to be comfortable with wet-in-wet.
In this example you can see there were places where the paper wasn't so wet, and I did hold on to a few hard edges.
But I'm going to take another look at the Speckmann book and look for subjects to practice the technique on. (If you like paintings of tulips, you should look for Speckmann's book in the library; I think her tulips the best I've ever seen!)
12 comments:
Laura
So glad I inspired you to give wet-in-wet a try. I love the colors and the combination of hard and soft edges works for me. It's a deceptively difficult technique.I am going to order Gail Speckman's book. thanks for mentioning it. It's great to get recommendations from other artists.
Jean
Laura, I just love this. The colors are vibrant and the apples are floating in pools of colors.
This is beautiful, Laura, the kind of loose, spontaneous watercolor painting I love.
i think i turned out great!
This is a leap for sure, Laura! More of these, please. It seems as though you've lifted off the ground with this and I'm glad to read your comment about having past the stage of particular expectations. It shows!
I love this wet-in-wet, it just vibrates with beauty! Your whole blog is so full of beautiful paintings!!
I agree this is spectacular! The combination of your luscious colors with the wet-in-wet technique and some hard edges really lifts this off the ground. I agree with Jean about the difficulty of combining hard and soft edges, it's not as easy as it looks, but you nailed it!
Hello Laura, Thanks for your visit and good wishes. My brushes have been left out to dry for so long, I really don't know how to start, but your work is surely an inspiration... lovely, washy and strong. Lots to look at . Happy 2009 and good painting!
I love the soft wet-in-wet together with the few clean edges - your colours joyous as usual. I love that you 'count on' the unexpected!
This is really a WOW painting. As I am only taking my watercolours with me to Sweden, you have inspired me to retry the wet-in-wet technique. Maybe I'll have some success this time round.
OOoooooh--I love this! I must've missed this post--I love this, Laura! Wonderful and oozy...beautiful colors, too.
Very beautiful.. Very nice choice of colors.. The left over whites are spectacular..
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