I had a two-hour workshop today on sketching and watercolor techniques with Marie Nichols, an instructor at Charleston School of the Arts.  She is an amazing lady with a kind, gentle approach to visual arts.

We started with blind contour drawings of shells and hands.  Let’s just say, my drawings were pretty messed up!  Then, we worked our way to a modified contour drawing where we could take peaks at our paper to follow the prominent lines in the object as we drew.  Finally, we concluded our drawing study with adding value to the modified contour drawing.  Hatching and cross-hatching, with shading added texture, shadows, and depth to our shells.

After our sketching lessons, we learned watercolor techniques.  Starting with a flat wash, we used a broad brush dipped in rather concentrated dark color and brushed it straight across the page.  We repeated these steps, covering our 140 lb. watercolor paper in one, even hue.

We contrasted the flat wash with a graded wash, where you dip the brush only once in the concentrated, dark pigment (in our example), and then brush across the top of the paper.  Then, we washed the brush the clean, dabbed in water and ran the brush partly across the dark brushstroke at the top to get a lighter value.  After each stroke, we dabbed our brush in water and voila, we had a graded background on our paper.

Other techniques included the use of salt, plastic wrap, and lifting to get different textures on the background wash.  We used drops of alcohol to achieve beautiful, round lighter spots on the paper.  Another technique involved wetting the paper first, then applying watercolor on vertical paper to get interesting secondary and tertiary colors from primary hues.  Finally, we splattered paint on the surface, then used a straw to get streaks.

After all of that work, we composed quick pieces of nature scenes using all of our new-found knowledge.  You see mine at the top…an ode to my youngest son, Joey.

–Sarah