Recently my husband and I were treated to a visit to the Milwaukee Art Museum, where an exhibition of Rembrandts was on display.  My art museum experience is limited, so I was the quintessential country bumpkin—totally awed and “wow-ed” by the size and richness of Rembrandt’s paintings.  (However, most of them were self-portraits.  One portrayal of Rembrandt goes a long way!)

Obviously, there is nothing like the medium of oils to capture depth and complexity of texture.  Acrylics may mock the effect, yet somehow they look “so acrylic”!  Meanwhile due to the fumes and my dicky pulmonary tubes, oils were never a consideration for me when I began my love affair with art. 

But I have no regrets!  I’m totally besotted with my watercolors—more and more as time passes and I become more versant in the beautiful language of transparency.   

The above rendering was achieved effortlessly—in fact all I did was charge transparent paint onto wet paper.  The water and paint did the rest.  This technique is intensely satisfying.  There can never be a duplication or a knock off, when an artist steps back while letting the materials make the art. 

This humbling experience reminds me that maybe I’m not really an artist at all—but rather just a facilitator.  Obviously, Rembrandt and others of his genius—past and present—really have been and are artists.  But for me, I’m thoroughly delighted with ”The Gift to Be Simple”! 

Margaret L. Been, ©2013

NOTE:  Although most water soluble paints (including acrylics and gouache) can be thinned to a modicum of semi-transparency, some watercolors are highly transparent.  Any watercolor starting with the word “Quinacridone” will be transparent, as will many of the Winsor & Newton paints.  As well as Winsor & Newton, I also use (the very affordable, professional quality) American Journey Paints.  American Journey has a gorgeous bluey-greenish transparent color called “June Bug”.  

Regardless of brand Permanent Magenta, Alizarin Crimson, Dioxazine Purple, Indigo, and French Ultramarine are normally transparent.  Gamboge (a gloriously rich yellow) is semi-transparent.  These, along with June Bug, are major players in most of my paintings.

Margaret L. Been, ©2012

. . . go for the gouache! 

I have plenty of failures with transparent watercolors.  Glazing is tricky.  Using the wrong colors on top of certain other colors, or trying to layer while the underpainting is still damp, can create murky mud in no time at all.  And although it’s a common and successful procedure with pastels, layering light colors over dark normally results in an unsightly mess on traditional watercolor papers made of cotton or linen. 

So what do you do when you make a murky mess?  Some artists might trash the paper and start with a clean sheet, but to me that’s a last resort.  I could (and sometimes do) flip my paper and start anew on the clean side.  But first of all, when my watercolors fail, I go for the gouache. 

Gouache is actually a form of opaque watercolor, sometimes called “body color”, although much thicker than watercolor paint.  It tends to sit on the surface of the paper, like oils, rather than diffuse.

You can make your own surrogate gouache by mixing Chinese white with your transparent paints, but I buy the gouache by the tube.  It’s wonderful stuff, and you can slap it on and trowel it around to get an effect similar to that of oils.  Like acrylics, gouache will cover anything and give most any painting a new start in life.  But gouache does not ruin brushes, and acrylics definitely will.  When used for gouache, brushes wash out beautifully—just as they would when used solely for transparent watercolor paint.* 

The above rendering was a disaster before my last ditch stand with gouache.  Rather than flip or toss the sheet of paper, I covered some jarringly rough (or just plain useless) areas with Holbein Artists’ Pearl White gouache mixed with watercolor tints in layers of lavender, green, and cobalt blue.  Holbein makes many other beautiful hues in gouache:  Pearl Gold, Pearl Copper, and most any solid color you might want. 

Warning:  avoid Holbein’s Artists’ Acrylic Gouache—unless acrylic painting is your thing, and you are accustomed to what that substance does to brushes.

I also use Winsor & Newton gouache, which is very good.  I’ve even managed with some low grade students’ quality gouache purchased from a craft store.  But the artists’ brands are far more satisfactory, and they leave a richer impression on the paper.  Like many things in the world of material goods, “you get what you pay for”!

When gouache is left in a palette for considerable time, it will dry up to the point of cracking and crumbling.  For that reason, I press out only as much as I need from the tube, onto a paper plate.  You wouldn’t want to put the gouache into your watercolor palette.  But on paper, especially when a painting is protected behind glass, the better quality brands of gouache should last without cracking.  I’ve seen gouache paintings from former centuries, on the Antiques Roadshow.  There’s a textured elegance to this age-old medium, especially when combined with transparent or semi-transparent watercolors.

Margaret L. Been, 2012

* My brushes are very precious to me.  I’ve invested in some excellent ones, and they’ll probably last a lot longer than I will on this earth. 

Two cruddy, cheap brushes have been set aside for my occasional foray into acrylics—for collage work, or that inspired fling of Golden’s liquid Interference® to add a bit of sheen to a watercolor painting. 

I still have a long way to go.

I haven’t been able to figure out the grab feature on this Mac yet so I wasn’t able to capture the whole screen (if anyone knows and wants to clue me in that would be way-cool).  so you’ll have to go check it out yourself. lol

watercolor doodle tree and heart

just playing around with colors and water and letting things run I found a cool tree under a heart-lit sky

wild larkspur doodle

This was just a doodle of some wildflowers up one of my very favorite places on Earth,  LaPlata Canyon north of Durango, Colorado on one of my mini-roadtrip outings,  alone/sans children, plein air try out….

didn’t work too well cause I was too self consious and too many people wanted to know what I was doing and to watch me (that made me uncomfortable)