Drips...

I've been subbing again in the watercolor class.  For the past two weeks we have been trying a new (to most of us) technique.  We began by thoroughly wetting the watercolor paper on both sides.  Then we thought about what colors we would like to use (I'm a primary color person) and began dripping them on our paper.

The wonderful thing about watercolor is that it runs and creates wonderful new shapes and colors.  If you raise your paper and turn it in various directions amazing things can happen...and also frightful messes can be revealed!

Our task was to see some 'thing' in these drips and then to paint around it  - highlighting and defining it. When you paint the space around the 'thing' you are painting negatively.

What we found was that it was VERY HARD to do.  We are so used to painting a thing - beginning with an idea and painting it.  To begin with no idea and then have it mysteriously revealed seemed a very backward challenge!

Well, the fun thing about this wet paper is that when you really mess up on one side you can just turn it over and begin again...  which I think several of us did.

So, this is what I ended up with that first day...

I confess, I didn't see any 'thing' but someone in class suggested that it could be a city skyline.  I took it home to dry.  During that week, I tried turning it in several different directions and cropped it here and there.

I think this is the forest fires out west.

This looks a little like an erupting volcano.

This is sort of nothing...back to square one...

So, I went back to class this week and showed these ideas. The class suggested turning the painting upside down (from the way I had it originally - who knew which way it should go) and they saw a waterfall! Hmmm...

Well, now I have worked on it ...played around with some more darks and lights and maybe it is a waterfall after all.  I keep hearing the voice of one of my instructors from a few years ago... "Go ahead and experiment.  It's only PAPER."  So, here is "The Waterfall"