Embroidered Collage

The watercolor paints from the pan shaded nicely in my last set of ACEOs so I wanted to try doing just that on the blank paper, instead of over a previous picture.  I painted twice, then added details with Pitt pens to make the cards at the bottom of the entry.

My first iteration of painting I mostly worked directly from the pans.  I had originally been intending to work only in the cool colors, but started experimenting with adding in some of the complementary warms instead.  All of the purple is mixed in some fashion, as there is no purple in my pans.  Much of it was done on the paper, adding a drop of red to still wet blue, for example, but some was mixed on the paletter area before application.

These were very interesting, but they really seemed to be just backgrounds, so I knew I wanted to do more.  I decided to push my exploration a bit further and see what happened if I painted on top of them.  I knew that water was supposed to pull the pigment on the paper back up, at least to some degree and I wanted to see what would happen.

Mostly I tried to add more value contrast.  I was able to see for myself how it was important to reserve the light areas, because trying to add yellow or white did nothing for the value, although it tinted the color already there a bit.  I could also tell that the paint on the paper was mixing into the newly applied paint to some extent.  For a few cards I tried to add details - deliberately using only a little water and just the tip of the brush to draw lines.

The card in the middle left spot actually had some of those lines on it and I hated it.  So it washed over it again.  This time I could REALLY see how I was able to break up those lines and push them around.  But I also came a lot closer to making mud and completely losing any color variations.  It also gave me a chance to see how easy it was to make colors darker by additional layers of paint.

So now I had some more distinctive shadings of color, but most of them didn't look like completed works of art to me, so I decided to try something else.  I pulled out the Pitt colored india ink pens that I had purchased a couple months ago.  The brush tip application method and semi-transparency of some of the colors complemented the watercolor look effortlessly, but with more control.  I primarily enhanced the boundaries of areas in order to add interest.

I decided to keep one of the cards, but here are the eight that will eventually be listed on etsy.  I find I enjoy the feel of the pigment on the paper, or at least this paper.  It just soaks in and it's almost like the paint is part of the paper, which is a very different tactile experience than I've had with acrylics.