Swimming Pretty

“If you want a place in the sun, you’ve got to put up with a few blisters.”
– Abigail Van Buren

 
Swimming Pretty
5″ x 7″ Watercolor

This one is a little bit of a happy accident.  I placed some stretched out gauze across a piece of watercolor paper and dabbed color onto it.   (I got a little too far into it, when I realized I forgot to mask off a place for my fish. )

After it dried, I removed the gauze and continued with a little negative painting around the coral.  Not to be undone by my own forgetfulness, I painted a little fish on a scrap of watercolor paper and attached it to the painting.  I think it will make a nice birthday card for a child.  I send hand painted cards to all my family members.  They love it!

Just for fun, I pulled the colored gauze out of the trash can and scanned this one.  Isn’t that fun? 




An even better birthday card, perhaps?

Gotta love those happy accidents. 

About Abigail Van Buren

Pauline Phillips, better known as Abigail Van Buren, wrote the syndicated “Dear Abby” column for 46 years. She was born in 1918 in Iowa. She had never written professionally when she contacted the San Francisco Chronicle’s editor and said she could do better than their current advice maven. Her version was an instant success. Her twin sister, Esther Lederer, became an advice columnist under the name Ann Landers. Phillips retired in 2002; her daughter, Jeanne Phillips, took over her column.

Gauze Mountain - September 8, 2009

"A man cannot be comfortable without his own approval."

– Mark Twain

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Gauze Mountain

4" x 6" Watercolor Postcard

This is a little sample of how to do the gauze on your watercolor paintings.

First, I laid down a really wet rough in of mountains, trees and water. Then I laid on the gauze pieces that I had cut and stretched earlier. After this, I loaded a brush with a pretty concentrated thickness of watercolor and dabbed it here and there across the gauze.

The second picture is what it looked like when I pulled the dried gauze off of it. The third picture is after I added some more detail. It's a quickie, but you get the idea, right?

It's a really fun way to add texture to your watercolor paintings.

About Mark Twain

Samuel Clemens, the iconic American humorist and writer, is better known by his pen name Mark Twain. He was born in 1835 in Missouri. He worked at several jobs, including steamboat pilot and miner. He wrote The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Prince and the Pauper, and other successful novels. His writing captured a very American vernacular and flavor, and helped create a distinctive American literature. He died in 1910.