Time to Play In Puddles again! I know, I've shown you "Brittany Autumn before, but today, I want to talk about Serendipity in watercolours, and this painting is a good example of that very thing.I wanted the main focus of this painting to be the dog and the flowers, so the background had to be made to be less prominent. I wanted that full, woodsy look, but didn't want to do the woodland detail that would detract from the dog. So I used a wet-in-wet technique that relies a lot on serendipity.
You'll notice that I kept to an analgous palette for the background. That gave me the depths of greens and the green/gold light I wanted. First, I applied water to the background where I wanted the colour, let it dry to the correct degree of dampness, then began to drop wet splotches of colour into the wet board. By shifting the board around, some judicious lifting of colour, and dropping in more colour suspended in various amounts of water, the muted, textured background began to take shape. From there, it was a case of knowing what colours and how many layers to add and knowing when to stop. Sometimes serendipity strikes and you get lucky and love what has appeared, while other times, . . .well, you can always start over. Please join me next week when I have fun Playing In Puddles again.
