Flat, Round, Funny and Small Brushes

I've returned to painting in gouache, for the most part, recently. After playing with and learning about transparent watercolor for about eight months, I feel comfortable merging it with gouache. I can incorporate the transparency and fluidity of watercolor in effective ways with the opacity and lovely painterly strokes of gouache in the same painting.

So, recently I decided I needed a couple new brushes. I work small. If you follow me here or on Facebook (fb.me/DeborahSecorArtworks), you know that. Most of my work is ATC size, which is always 2.5" x 3.5", the same size as a playing card or sports trading card. So my brushes are small--but not tiny!

Let me show you my home team, along with the newbies I just added:

At the top right you'll see my three "funny" brushes. They've been badly abused over the years, resulting in some messed-up bristles that work well to make a lot of the little marks that suggest things like tree leaves, bushes, grasses, or whatever needs a messy little stroke.

The middle three are my go-to brushes, a Chinese wolf hair brush that makes the nicest long, fluid lines, my trusty half-inch flat brush that is used to paint easily three-quarters of every painting, and a round brush that creates lovely, lush strokes.

The bottom three are the newest members of the tribe. The two small round ones are proving useful for dots, lines, and other small touches, while the chisel blender is running a close second to my half-inch in usefulness, but for smaller flat strokes.

I'm not an "every hair" painter, of course. I like to suggest detail more than actually painting it. I try to work with the largest brush I can for as long as I can, which means my workhorse half-inch brush is key. Consider the scale of a half-inch to 3.5"--it's HUGE, relatively speaking. I can't even figure out what width brush you'd use in a 9' x 12" painting, if it was of the same proportion, but I expect it would be the size of a house painting brush! That large size keeps the strokes fresh and painterly.

Maybe this series of shots will help you see what that looks like:

Half-inch flat brush strokes.

Large round brush strokes added. 

More flat strokes, with some funny brush strokes. 

More funny brush strokes, large and small.

Details suggested. 

Hope this makes you think about your brushes and brushwork. If you have thoughts or questions, let's discuss things.

February Skies and Clouds

I've returned to gouache this month, as well as skies and clouds, one of the subjects I love most in the Southwest landscape.

These were all painted on a paper that's new to me, Fluid Watercolor Hot Press Block. Each painting is 2.5" x 3.5". I wanted a good hard, smooth paper. This block does the trick quite well. Hot press paper allows the paint to remain on top of the paper, not soaking in as quickly as a cold press paper does. That means that the strokes are more evident, the mixes flowing more where the paint is thinner (or when I used transparent watercolor), giving a rather more painterly look that I like.



Recently the clouds were so spectacular over Sandia, the mountain range on the east side of Albuquerque, that I snapped a few photos. This one was perfect for my first experiment with this paper:

I took this shot along 1-40 west of Albuquerque somewhere. A blue sky day, with few clouds, it was fun to play with transparent watercolor for the sky, then work the clouds and land plane in gouache:

I used a photo taken from the west mesa for the sky, cloud and mountain in this one, then made up the foreground from imagination and memory. I like the scale I achieved here:

Here's the new paper, which is a 4' x 6" block that's glued on the long sides only, and two of my paintings done in it. I remove the page, and then cut the paintings down to the standard ATC size, 2.5" x 3.5". 

August to October Update

I've done a good bit of painting this fall. I finally purchased some professional grade watercolor paint, a 24-color set of Mission Mijello Gold, and a few tubes of Qor, and Winsor Newton colors, as well as a full set of Daniel Smith dot cards. Huge differences result from having excellent materials.

All of these are 2.5" x 3.5" in size. 

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May-June Update: flowers and square landscape paintings

Since it's become far too obvious that I'm not blogging regularly anymore, I'll just make it official and declare that once in a while I'll do a painting update. here's a compendium since I last posted in April.

I was longing to plant my little patio garden, but the date of last freeze here in Albuquerque is May 20, so I decided to scratch the itch by doing some flower paintings. While I waited I painted.

3"x 3" gouache

I've been longing to learn a little more about painting with transparent watercolors. I've been acquainted with Maggie Latham since the old WetCanvas days, back in about 2004, and reconnected with her on Facebook more recently. We even traded ATCs last year, which is a sad story, as it turned out that two paintings she sent me never arrived. (I hate to think some unscrupulous person received them, and still harbor a small hope that they'll turn up one day, perhaps one of those times when something is found in a crevice in the Post Office 20 years later. <sigh> I know, unlikely.) She's so generous that she surprised me with other paintings of hers! Isn't this one lovely?

Maggie Latham 2017 ATC watercolor

Inspired by Maggie's beautiful watercolor washes, showcased in personal challenge she she did in April, painting 100 4"x4" watercolor seascapes, I realized I had a LOT to learn about how to use  transparent watercolor effectively. All of her "little gems" were done with multiple colors, as she skillfully let the paint do what it does, not trying to over-control it. 

I needed a subject to play with, however. I bet you can see where I'm going with this. Flowers, of course! Have you seen the work of Jean Haines? I mean, she's world famous for her very loose, wonderfully washy watercolors. I loved looking at her floral paintings and derived a lot of inspiration from her work, as you'll see here.

The paintings below are small, so I've posted them with a white mat to keep the scale closer to the original. 

Daisies, 2.5" x 3.5" watercolor

Poppies, 2.5" x 3.5" watercolor

Glories, 2.5" x 3.5" watercolor

Looking Up, 2.5" x 3.5" watercolor

Blue and White, 6" x 2.5" watercolor

After Jean Haines, 2.5" x 3.5" watercolor

Glads, 2.5" x 3.5" watercolor

Hollyhocks, 2.5" x 3.5" watercolor

Pink Rose, 2.5" x 3.5" watercolor

Mini rose, 1' x 1.25" watercolor

And these are a fun series I did, returning to gouache, all 3"x3" on different watercolor papers,

So that's it for May and June. Hope you enjoy looking at them!