We're still working on negative painting. This time our watercolor teacher loaned us some of her pictures of waterlilies and lotus plants. First I sketched a few to figure out the shapes, then I got an idea for composition. To prep my paper (12x16) , I wet the whole thing then added medium yellow, aliziran crimson and thalo blue , leaving white spaces where my main flowers and leaves would be. After it dried, I sketched in two main flowers and three main leaves. It's hard to make the lily pads look flat, yet show some dimension. I painted around all of the main shapes with a slightly darker value of the background colors, then waited for it to dry again. Repeat the process until I had as many lily pads as I wanted. After that I did a little positive painting to accent the colors and then drew in veins using a broken twig instead of a small brush. I ended up going in with another darker wash of thalo green and turquoise to try to get the pond darker.
I think I'll try this again, but with yellow flowers and a green pond this time. Maybe a bee or butterfly? fish?
