Abstract Watercolours

In this post I would like to briefly cover two things:

  1. The abstract watercolour mosaics
  2. The unique, one-of-a-kind, customized sketchbook the mosaics are displayed in

Let’s start with the watercolour mosaics. Each of these little squares above are beautiful, original, inspirational, abstract watercolour seascapes. They all started out as larger paintings or experiments that “didn’t go to plan”. All artists have them! I cut them up into 1 inch squares, picked the ones I liked best and arranged them in a grid on some white cartridge paper.

This is a wonderful way to create beautiful, new, original art from those paintings we, for some reason, are not happy with! Each little square can be inspiration for a new larger piece of art. The squares above I see as landscapes. The colours are Ultramarine Blue, Prussian Blue, Raw Umber and Burnt Umber.

Above, the colours are Monte Amiata Natural Sienna and Prussian Blue, plus a very tiny amount of Gold mica powder. I see them as landscapes and seascapes…

Below we have varying tones of Indigo, along with Cobalt Teal Blue and Manganese Blue Hue. All beautiful abstract seascapes and landscapes that inspire me.

Now we come to the very unique sketchbook I have put these abstract watercolours into. This sketchbook started life as a vintage notebook that I bought in a charity shop a number of years ago; it dates from the 1970’s.

I decided to remove some of the pages from this notebook to “thin it out” a bit. Then I set about collaging all the remaining pages with vintage collage items from my collection. It took me about 3 hours (and several glue sticks!) to collage all of it. I ended up with a totally unique, one-of-a-kind, sketchbook. There isn’t and never will be another one exactly like it ever. I like that.

This sketchbook is full now. Two thirds of it are watercolour sketches and the other third is some of my early acrylic and mixed media work. I’m going to look out for another vintage book I can turn into a sketchbook…

Pebbles

A pebble pile! This is the same collection of pebbles that you can read about HERE. I rearranged the pebbles in a different order and painted them on larger paper. This one is painted on Arches Aquarelle rough paper and measures 28.5 cm x 19.5 cm. The colours I used were Buff Titanium, Flint Grey, Jane’s Grey, Monte Amiata Natural Sienna and Quinacridone Burnt Orange by Daniel Smith plus Ultramarine (Green Shade) and Burnt Sienna by Winsor & Newton.

I had a bit of a wobble half way through painting this, as it was starting to look a bit messy and I nearly gave up on it. I’ve heard other artists talk about paintings going through a “messy stage” but they say you have to “trust the process”… ! So I persevered and trusted the process. And I was pleasantly surprised with the results – better than I was expecting.

I chose these pebbles specifically for their colours, textures and awesome patterns. And I tried to capture the essence of those in my painting by building up the watercolours in about 3 layers. Now I must get on with other painting projects I have on the go…

Feathers

This is one of my early watercolour sketches (from 2018) but it’s still one of my favourites. Both were painted on Arches Aquarelle paper, 140 lb cold pressed. The colours I used were Payne’s Grey and Sepia by Cotman.

I love being by the sea and there’s always plenty of seagull feathers to gather from the beach and harbour. I have a little collection in a pot in my studio. Payne’s Grey is a perfect seagull colour, whereas Sepia is a perfect colour for the young seagulls which are soft light brown colours.

Having a lovely new blog here on WordPress to document my watercolour journey has made me look back and reflect – on where I started out and how far I’ve come. And to look to the future, how I would like my watercolour journey to move forward…