Watercolour:  This is a dificult medium requiring a lot of patience in the beginning (mistakes are hard to rectify).  However it is a wonderful adventure when you start a piece of work as there can be accidents and discoveries along the way that make the whole experience so much fun.

Style: There are many ways to use the Watercolour medium, Wet into Wet, Dry-Brush and all states in between. What is clear is that you have to think of the "light and design or composition"of the painting way before you first touch the paper with pencil or paint.

The Start:  A pre-sketch of a farm-house in Prevessin-Moen near the Swiss border.  This allows me to take notes on direction of the sun, colours and any other particularities of the subject.

 

The farm no longer exists! It has been replaced by an ugly and modern breeze block house with no charm and none of the trees.  It is a sad loss.  This needs to be painted for posterity.

Phase 2: A colour sketch of another French farm.house near the city of Grenoble.  This will be turned into a full painting on 1/2 Imperial Arches Rough.  This is a mix of wet-into-wet and hard and soft edges.

Use of white allows for a clean and crisp style.  Its not necessary to add colour.  This is the choice of the artist.

 

 Arnex Vineyard - Version 1: Step by Step -

This is an unfinished work which is done on Watercolour Board...A swiss "cabin de vignoble" (Grape growers cabin) near Geneva. 

Version 2:  This is another work (Same subject) in progress which has used a different colour palette which warms up the painting and creates movement inthe sky to match the direction of the growth of the tree which is contantly pushed by the wind.

 

Atmosphere:  The creation of atmosphere is essential in order to trap the viewer.  This is another exercise on Watercolour Board whcih has allowed a lot of water and colour in the sky and work in tones of orange to create what is in fact a winter landscape which is normally white and blue.

 

 

 

L'Herault - D'Agde  This painting was done during a class with Tony Couch. The soft and hard edges make for a wonderful sultry feeling in the sunshine of the south of France