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I live on the Isle of Anglesey, with my wife, Zara, three cats, and a pug called Alfie. Anglesey has many beautiful beaches, and the Snowdonia mountain range is just a short drive away. Living here, inspiration is not far away.
Watercolours have fascinated me my entire life. Over the years, I have collected many books and art materials, and I can never resist visiting an art gallery, museum, book, or art supplies shop.
My favourite exhibition was of the Watercolours by J.M.W. Turner. It showed his tools, art bag, and watercolour sketches from the Grand Tour. I was amazed by how thick he applied the paint and by the notes written on his sketches for future painting reference, for when he returned to his London home. It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, which I will never forget.
I watched television shows by Alwyn Crawshaw on Watercolours, Watercolour Challenge, and other art-related shows I could find. I love Bob Ross; his enthusiasm for art is contagious. He teaches us so much about colour and composition, all with a smile. Watching tutorial DVDs and YouTube videos enables us to learn at our own pace. We can pause, rewind, and re-watch a chapter at our leisure. If you prefer reading, you can look at some illustrated tutorial articles.
Obstacles to Painting: Colour Blindness
Colour blindness had stopped me from painting for most of my life. I was scared to use the wrong colours; the thought of people laughing at me for painting something the wrong colour held me back. Yes! I have painted green skies before now.
Everything changed when I met my wife, Zara. One day, when we were courting, she visited my home and discovered my art supplies. When Zara asked to see my paintings, she was shocked when I said, “I do not paint!”
Zara could see and feel my frustration. People do not understand how differently colour blind people see things. Together, we worked on selecting a palette of colours that took away some of the problems associated with my colour blindness.
My landscape style draws inspiration from my favourite watercolourist, David Bellamy, and the beautiful, harmonious paintings of China's Master landscape painters. My dream is to one day visit China and paint its wondrous scenery. I enjoy painting from my imagination, drawing on memories from places I have visited, or embellishing the natural landscape to create something unique.
My wife and I had an art gallery a few years ago. I did picture framing between painting my watercolours; Zara painted seascapes and helped with the framing. It was a wonderful time. We loved every minute and met so many amazing artists and art collectors. I look forward to sharing some tips with you on mounting and framing in a future blog.
The Revelation: Conquering the Fear of White Paper
Like many people starting a new hobby, we buy the wrong paper and materials. I was guilty of this, which led to utter frustration; I almost gave up!
Trying to follow simple lessons from books and DVDs, I could not understand why my paintings looked like something my three-year-old niece had painted. I had followed every step, but they did not look like the illustration in the book.
Out of desperation, I unwrapped a new pad of watercolour paper; it was expensive! I was saving it for when I felt confident enough to use it for a "proper" painting—which, in hindsight, was the right thing to do!
I laid an A5 piece of practice paper alongside a piece of high-quality paper. Without a care, I laid a wash across both sheets of paper, then a blue wash across the sky with a single swipe across both sheets and continued to graduate the washes down the paper. I could not believe the difference!
Mountain shapes were painted, selecting random colours and dropping them in, all with total freedom. I even lifted out some colour and let the paint and wet paper surface do its magic. At this moment, I fell in love with the magic of watercolour painting.
As I reflected on the paper test, I wondered how many other people who wanted to learn to paint in watercolour gave up at this point, simply because they used a budget paper. My recommendation is always to buy the best paper you can; some companies even send out free sample packs.
The way water and paint join in harmony is what makes it so special to me. It has its own spirit if you listen to it, let it flow through your brush. The feeling of freedom of movement as the water moves pigment around the paper still fills me with excitement.
Creating My Colour Palette
The fear of colour held me back for over 55 years! Books on colour mixing, colour wheels, and colour theory all meant nothing to me visually; however, they did help me understand how colour works.
How did I select the colours for my palette? The first question I had to answer was, what do I want to paint? The answer: Land and Seascapes.
Once this was established, the next step was to work out the local colour palette. What colours are the mountains, the sea, sky, trees, and sand on the beach (both wet and dry), etc., where I live?
This is a very important thing to consider when buying paints, because the light value and colour hues vary so much, depending on where you live. The Snowdonia mountains are very purple and sometimes appear to be indigo.
Swatch time. Over the years, I had acquired a lot of paint sets, both tubes and pans, from many different manufacturers. After swatching the colours, my wife Zara helped me select those that best matched our local colour palette. I may have bought one or two extra colours that were missing to complete the collection of paints.
The goal was to take away the fear of using the wrong colour when I painted. To make life even easier, we renamed a few of the colours to those of the actual subject they represented, for example, yellow ochre = sand.
I started painting on postcard-sized paper, and I still do most of the time. I shared an exhibition space with Zara for a month, where I showed a collection of my artwork. I was very nervous exhibiting my art for the first time. I do not know who was more shocked when people complimented me on how my colours matched the mountains perfectly, especially when they found out I was colour blind.
My Watercolour Journey Continues
I love travel brushes; I use them in my studio, and I also carry a set in my art bag. I came across fuumuui while buying a travel paintbrush set, and it's a really great set. I'm so glad to have received an invitation from fuumuui, and I'll be sharing my watercolour painting techniques and product usage here later.
Join me soon on my journey into watercolour painting with Fuumuui Art Brushes.
