Day 18 : #30x30DirectWatercolor2018 : Guest Post!

No Post Today! I’m tied up with some contract work.

I do have a mid-point update from Suhita for you!

Suhita Says:
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At the halfway point of #30x30DirectWatercolor2018, and I’m looking back at the half-month with some thoughts.

If you aren’t a natural direct-watercolorist, (I’m not!) then this is a HARD challenge! To see exclusively in shape and yet keep a piece from being overworked takes a whole lot of focus. The impulse to just pick up a pen and finish the piece is strong!

Some subjects are easier to get loose with because they’re forgiving. Like this landscape with simple perspective.  Knowing I didn’t have to get the “drawing” right meant I was free to focus on capturing the feel of the blazing heat. I couldn’t resist painting in the two figures: to me, they add a story to the piece.

I was quite pleased with this next piece because it combined many challenges for me: painting a person/people without line, creating the feel of space and activity without getting too specific. And, the piece is darker, literally, than a lot of what I paint.

On other days I just took it easy and painted stuff I understood well and had painted before. Like this skull that sits on my studio table, a ready model whenever I need one. I lost painted this on the wrong side of a sheet of Arches paper.(The other side was used for a rather unsuccessful piece). Doing this totally takes the pressure off creating a ‘good piece’ and it’s amazing how much it adds to flow and looseness. if only I could convince myself to work like this more!

All my piece use white gouache. I use it like I would another color, and while I try to save my big whites, I never save smaller ones if I feel it makes me work tightly just to keep the white paper.

So what have I learned so far? (Besides that this is hard work?)

• Seeing in shape-first is slowly becoming less difficult.
• I am enjoying watching watercolor move on the paper with no line to hold it within bounds, and I’m learning a lot about pigments and transparency in the process.
• If I hang on for another few weeks and work at this, there will be more insights and progress.
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  Suhita Shirodkar
  Blog: sketchaway.wordpress.com
  Instagram: @suhitasketch