Distilled Sunlight

Daffodils on a bright spring day - they really are like the purest sunlight!

I tried to keep colours more delicate than my usual style uses - I wanted a fresh, soft look, not too many dark areas. I think I succeeded!

Distilled Sunlight
Watercolour on Fabriano paper, 12.5 x 10 inches

Exciting news! I added this painting to my RedBubble account tonight and it has already been featured!!!!!

What is Watercolour?

Katherine Tyrell has an in-depth article about this often divisive question on her blog, Making a Mark today - it's well worth reading!

For me, watercolour is just that - watercolour paint (as labelled on the tube or pan), activated with water and painted on paper. Anything else should be labelled as watermedia. If, once dried, paint cannot be re-activated with water it isn't watercolour. I think it would be a terrible shame if the traditional media of watercolour, used by so many of our great artists in the past, was lost in a sea of watered down acrylics!

Wishing for Spring

When this challenge was posted on painting friends I had to have a go at painting it! The idea is to choose one of a selection of references and paint it in two hours or less - not easy but fun!

Narcissus
9 x 7 inches, Fabriano Artistico extra white paper

Pink and White

Another from last year, inspired again by the stunning Bodnant Gardens, near Conwy, North Wales.

I have a bit of a reputation for backgrounds, but for this I decided to leave the background as the white of the paper. I think it works really well, letting the echinacea take centre stage with no distractions!

Pink and White
14 x10, watercolours on Fabriano Artistico 140lb CP paper

Beach Pebbles

My second play with acrylic inks, this time with a wider range of colours at my disposal. There was a challenge on paintingfriends.com to draw with ink, and without lifting the pen from the paper (known as "contour drawing"). I decided to combine it with an experiment in glazing with acrylic inks.

The results aren't bad! I like the colours and the inks act almost in the same way as watercolours, with the main difference being the inability to lift colours once dry!

Beach Pebbles, Acrylic ink on watercolour paper, 9 x 7.5 inches