Art FAQ – Marion Boddy-Evans

5 October 202116 October 2021

What Colour is the Sea?

“Sea with waves does not have a universal colour, but he who sees it from dry land sees it dark in colour and it will be so much darker to the extent that it is closer to the horizon, [though] he will see there a certain brightness or lustre which moves slowly in the manner of white sheep in flocks
” … from the land [you] see the waves which reflect the darkness of the land, and from the high seas [you] see in the waves the blue air reflected in such waves.”
— Leonardo da Vinci, “Leonardo on Painting“, edited by Martin Kemp, Yale University Press, 2001, page 170

As frustrating an answer as it is, I think the true answer to the question “What Colour is the Sea?” always has to be “it depends”. There might be a single-word answer for what colour the sea is right now, from where you’re looking, but there is no single-word answer that is always right. (And certainly not living somewhere where the weather is as variable as Scotland.)

The colour of the sea depends on an assortment of elements, including the depth of the sea, how much wave action there is, how rocky or sandy the coast is, time of day it is, the weather. I’ve seen sea that’s dark near-black and sea that’s turquoise, sea that’s a mass of white waves and sea that’s white from reflected clouds. In summer, at sunset, I regularly see sea that’s purple and pink and yellow without a hint of blue or green. And in winter, at night, from my studio the sea a uniform blackness, with a handful of tiny lights from fishing boats and automated lighthouses.

There’s no shortage of options available to a us when it comes to choosing colors for the sea. A colour chart from any paint manufacturer will provide you will the full range. But the reason I have so many ‘sea colours”‘ isn’t because a sea painting needs so many, rather it’s because I like colours and so have built up quite a collection of blues over the years, though I do have a core set that I use.

So although I searched through my paints for the various blues to paint the chart shown in the photo, I used only a few in a painting. Painting a colour chart makes it easy to compare the various colors and the opacity or transparency of each, and to remind you of options beyond favourites.

I hardly ever use ultramarine, a blue so many consider fundamental. If things aren’t going well, I’ll revert to my beloved blue, Prussian, and after that phthalo turquoise. But often blue isn’t the answer anyway, and then I’ll reach for colours to mix interesting greys, and orange, magenta, yellow, iridescent silver …

See Also: Art Workshop Photos: Looking at Blues

25 August 202110 September 2021

The Colour Theory Triangle

My favourite starting point for colour mixing is the colour triangle rather than the more familiar colour circle. I think it’s easier to understand and makes remembering complementary colours simple.

(If you don’t see the video above, click here to see it on my Vimeo channel.)

The fundamental rule of colour theory for painting is that there are three primary colours: red, blue and yellow. The second rule of colour theory is that mixing two primary colours togethe creates secondary colours, that is purples, oranges, and greens. On a colour triangle, the three primary colours are at the points, and the three secondary are on the “flat bits”. All you need remember initially are the three primaries, because you can always mix two to remind yourself what they create.

The other reason I like the colour triangle so much as it makes it easy to remember complementary colours. These are colours that make one another look brighter, and also desaturate each other (make them less intense in colour). On the colour triangle, complementaries are the colour opposite, so Blue + Orange, Red + Green, Yellow + Purple..

The first color triangle is attributed to the 19th century French painter Delacroix. A notebook of his dating from around 1834 has drawing of a triangle with the three primaries written in as rouge (red) at the top, jaune (yellow) on the left, and bleu (blue) on the right, plus added the three secondaries as orange, violet, and vert (green). Delacroix adapted the triangle from a color wheel in an oil painting handbook by J.F.L. Mérimée, a painter he knew.
(Source: “Colour and Culture” by John Gage. Thames and Hudson, London, 1993. Page 173.)

12 March 2020

When Is Size Not a Dimension? (Clue: Paper)

When is size not a dimension is the art version of the riddle “When is a door not a door?”

When we’re talking about paper, size does mean how big a sheet of paper is, but also what stops a sheet of paper reacting like paper towel when you add paint to it. It’s what makes paint sit “on” the surface to some extent rather than immediately soaking in and spreading. Most Western paper is internally sized, meaning it’s mixed in during the making of the paper, rather than externally sized (“painted on top”) or unsized.

Manufacturers use the terms “watercolour” / “acrylic” / “mixed media” / “drawing” paper to help guide us amidst the overwhelming array of choices. Typically:

Drawing paper is very smooth, allowing for fine detail, and usually a lighter weight.
Acrylic or oil painting paper is sometimes textured like canvas, sometimes smooth, and sometimes already primed with gesso.
Watercolour paper has three finishes and comes in the biggest range of weights
— hot pressed, smooth
— not = not hot pressed; slight texture
— rough = bumpy
Mixed media paper is typically slightly textured and a little heavier so will take some wet but not too much.
Pastel paper has a textured surface, sometimes a sandpaper-like surface, to help hold pastel.

But just because it’s sold as “watercolour paper” doesn’t mean “thou shalt not adulterate this sheet of paper with acrylics, it’s made for watercolour and nothing but watercolour”. We can use any medium on any paper, though the results obviously depend on the surface of the paper and its weight (thickness), i.e. the characteristics of that individual sheet

You can draw on watercolour paper, you can use watercolour on drawing paper; you can use acrylic and oil paint on watercolour paper; you can use water on pastel paper to turn the pastel into paint. But you cannot expect thin paper to handle paint in the same way thick paper does. You can’t expect pencil to behave on a textured paper in the same way as it does on smooth paper.

You don’t need to gesso (use primer) paper to use acrylic on it, you can use it as is, with thick or thin paint. Adding gesso seals and changes the surface and gives a different effect to plain paper. A layer of not-too dilute acrylic on paper or acrylic medium seals the surface too, stopping it giving watercoloury effects. Gessoing paper before using oil paint stops the oil leaching out into the fibres.

If a painting dries buckled, you can flatten it by spraying the reverse to dampen the sheey and letting it dry between boards.

There isn’t a right or wrong side to most paper as it’s internally sized, but there is a difference to the surface of each side, sometimes minimal, sometimes obvious.

If the paper you’re using is balling up and tearing, switch to a thicker paper or use less liquid as that’s the surface of the paper being damaged. Heavier weight paper as it takes more working and buckles less, and dries less quickly than thin as the core retains moisture.

Thicker paper may be more expensive but you can usually paint on both sides so you get two goes with it. If you’re using watercolour as you even can put it under a tap and wash the paint off; while it won’t be as good as new and you can damage the surface if you’re aggressive, it’s good for experimenting.

5 November 20195 November 2019

Does Destroying a Painting Mean You’re Giving Up?

The short answer: No.

The long answer: No, it means you’re recognising that it isn’t worth spending more time or effort on that particular painting. Not every painting is going to be successful and it’s unrealistic to expect it, you’re setting yourself up for failure.

A line I’ve remembered from the book “Art and Fear” is ”The function of the overwhelming majority of your artwork is simply to teach you how to make the small fraction of your artwork that soars.” (Looking it up, I see it was 2005 I reviewed it; read review here.)

I think destroying paintings becomes problematic only if you’re consistently stopping at the same point, never trying to push past it and find out if you might resolve it. It’s already not working, so you don’t have to worry about ruining it.

I also don’t think something should be destroyed on the same day it was created, or you stopped working on it, because once there’s a bit of time between making it and reviewing it we can be more objective. I go through my paintings on paper two or three times a year and sort out the ones to keep, the ones to be torn up, and the maybe ones who get another look before I decide.

3 November 20193 November 2019

Confidence in Your Own (Artistic) Potential to Find (Art) Solutions

I was skimming an article on “feeling the fear but doing it anyway” on Entrepreneur when I was stopped by the words s the words: “Confidence comes when you’ve accepted your own potential to find solutions“. It felt like an explanation of what’s at the core of painting intuitively.

You have a repertoire of art techniques and materials to hand, and select from these to create potential as well as solve problems of your own making in a painting. You trust you’re not a one-trick pony and can reproduce an effect more often than not because practice underpins it. Practice doesn’t make perfect, but helps us continue.

When you recognize uncertainty, you recognize that you may influence the outcome. Embrace the uncertainty and see if you can find the ride intriguing. Do something and see what results, respond to that, and to that, and to that. That’s painting with intuition.

I’m curious about how you define painting intuitively? Leave a comment on my blog and let me know.

25 August 201925 August 2019

Art FAQ: Will It Lead to Better Results?

“I can see how experimenting and letting go of the outcome can increase the joy of painting but how does that square with the desire to improve continually and do your best work? Does one just have to trust that experimenting will lead to better results in time? ” — Eddie

My short answer is “yes”.

My longer answer starts with seeing the journey as circuitous and tangential not linear, much as it would be easier if it were.

Being open to trying new things, materials, subjects, approaches simply to see what happens, to see where it may lead you. Taking the bits you find interesting and intriguing further on the journey (not necessarily the same as the bits you like or others regard as successful) whilst shrugging off what turned out to be hideous, discarding that which was unenjoyable. Always remembering, some things may be a matter of wrong place, wrong time; it’s not necessarily a never again situation. Then mixing the new with the existing, the familiar and the favourites.

Happy accidents become familiar by deliberately trying to repeat the result. Even with not entirely controllable techniques predictability increases with repetition as you acquire knowledge of the range of possible results, and how you might respond to these.

Spending time looking at what you’ve done, pinpointing what you like and don’t, what you might try again and won’t, is part of the journey. Don’t throw things out too soon, in the emotion of the moment. Do it dispassionately at a later date.

It should be like pure science, research to see what happens and to learn, driven by curiosty, rather than applied science, driven by a desired outcome. Intertwined but with different approaches, hopes and expectations, for different times and projects.

Paint, play, ponder, paint, that’s my path.

In an interview I read earlier today, author Susan Steinberg describes her writing process in a way that I think fits painting and drawing too, of it emerging not coming out fully formed first time:

“There are several writers who have told me that they assume that when I sit down to write, that I write a sentence and then I don’t move on until that sentence is perfect. And then I write the next sentence and that’s how I write. And when they find out that that I make the biggest mess you can imagine. I just write and write and it doesn’t always make sense and I go really far out there and then pull back and start to pare it down.”
(source: Susan Steinberg on the Value of Writing an Ugly Draft by Diane Cook, Literary Hub, 23 August 2019)

5 March 20193 March 2019

Updated Advice on Acrylic Paint to Water Ratio

There’s now one less thing to worry about when painting, and it’s how much water you can or should mix with acrylic paint without ruining its adhesion. Golden Artist Colors (a USA employee-owned company renowned for its artist’s quality paint and techical info) have updated their advice:

“For years our standard advice was that a 1:1 ratio was very safe for most of our paints and mediums; plus, it had the advantage of being easy to remember while greatly erring on the side of caution. However, our current testing shows you can go a lot further than that before encountering significant issues. Just how far? We think you will be surprised.”

The article gets into the specifics, but for me this is the takeaway:

“We got no adhesion failure of any of our paints, no matter how thinned down with water, when applied on top of acrylic gesso.”

In the FAQ on thinning acrylics I wrote for Painting.About.com in 2006 (my original version, as here, not the current surreal rewritten-by-who-knows-who version) I’d said this:

“When it comes to thinning acrylics, the only ‘rule’ is to not mix acrylic paint with more than 50 per cent water. Any more than this and it may loose its adhesive qualities and peel off at some stage. You can mix in as much acrylic medium (glazing, texture paste, etc) as you like because it’s got the acrylic resin in it that acts as the ‘glue’ that makes the paint ‘stick’. (Golden describe their mediums as ‘colorless paint’! )”

If painting on a large canvas, I tend to use glazing medium as well as water to thin paint because in addition to adding “glue” it also increases working time (slows drying). Mostly I simply don’t think about it, and merrily spray paint with water to make it drip and run.

Where I have encountered adhesion issues is with water-thinned acrylic ink lifting as I brush over it, despite being touch dry. Leaving it overnight helps, presumably as the paint binder then cures. I sometimes then also apply a layer of glazing medium with a soft brush, leaving this overnight again, before continuing on top. But mostly if I find it’s lifting — you see the colour appearing on the brush — I just keep going and deal with it.

12 February 201912 February 2019

The Wrong Side of the Paper?

“Does a sheet of paper have a right and a wrong side” is one of those questions that I think gets answered with that frustrating “it depends”.

It depends whether there’s any texture to the surface and whether it’s primed painting paper or not. The latter is the easy: it will be primed on one side only, so that’s the “right side” (not that you can’t use the other side too). The former depends on which texture you like the best., you can use either.

The watercolour paper I’m using (350gsm Seawhite of Brighton NOT) has a gridded texture on one side and slight bumps on the other. I mostly prefer the latter, because I find the grid can tell a contradictory story if I end up highlighting it with, for example, wet paint catching on the ridges as it dries vertically, by dry brushing, or using oil pastel run across the surface lightly.

In the photo below you see the difference between the two sides (click on the photo to enlarge it). I was working on two A3 sheets side by side, and inadvertently had one the wrong way around.

Is it a difference most other people would notice? Probably not. Would someone else prefer the side I think is the “wrong” side? Probably. Does it matter. No. The right side is the side you like, and if anyone says otherwise they’re on the wrong side.

What are your thoughts? Post a comment below.

PS: A big thank you to Christine M; you know why.

27 January 201922 January 2019

How I Do It : Splattering Paint

So having discovered my phone has a slow-motion option on its videos, I’ve been playing with it a bit. This short clip shows how I splatter paint, a technique I use a lot for my sheep and seascape paintings.

It’s a “happy accident” technique you learn to control through practice. The consistency of the paint is crucial, and that you learn through trial-and-error.

If you don’t see the video above, click on this link.

The quality of the video isn’t brilliant because it was done late afternoon in low winter light. And imagine my phone balance precariously on my tripod, held by various bulldogclips. Perhaps I ought to set a Patreon goal that relates to better video equipment?

13 January 201929 December 2018

The Rule of Odds

The Rule of Odds in art runs along the lines of “whatever odd thing you do, people will put it down to your being arty”.

No, wait, that’s the Rule of Oddbods.

The Rule of Odds in art is that a composition will be more dynamic if there’s an odd number of elements in the composition, say three or seven, rather than an even number, say two or six. The reasoning is that having an odd number means your brain can’t pair them up or group them as easily, that there’s somehow always one thing left over, which keeps your eyes moving across the composition.

Why do we pair things up naturally? Perhaps it’s because our body is designed in pairs: two eyes, two ears, two hands, two feet, and so on. (Okay, only one nose, but it’s got two nostrils!) Whether we’re painting apples, apple trees, or apple-eating creatures (aka still-life, landscape, or figures), the same Rule of Odds applies.

Take a look at the brushes in the jar in these two versions of a painting.

If I asked you to count the brushes in the left-hand photo, you’d likely be able to do so quickly — once glance and you’ve taken it all in. Whereas in the right-hand version you’d have to spend a little more time and you may, ultimately, be uncertain because some brushes are hidden behind others — you’re spending longer looking and engaging with the composition.

It’s the Rule of Odds in action. That I painted this scene at all, well that’s the Rule of Oddbods.