On the road with watercolour
Watercolours offer convenience when travelling and are eminently suited for use outdoors. Richard Bond shares the contents of his painting bag and offers his tips for painting en plein air
Watercolours offer convenience when travelling and are eminently suited for use outdoors. Richard Bond shares the contents of his painting bag and offers his tips for painting en plein air
In Britain the tradition of painting outdoors in watercolour has a long and distinguished history stretching back to the early 18th century. The convenience and portability of the medium enables artists to record the fleeting effects of nature at first hand.
Watercolour paints are quick and easy to set up, clean and fast drying, and have a transparent quality well suited to the depiction of light and atmosphere. To create a successful painting, the artist must select and simplify, and always avoid overworking. For this reason, watercolour is about more than the simple recording of appearances. It is about mood and atmosphere, and mystery and suggestion. It is about distilling and summarising the visual world, and capturing not just the look, but the spirit of the scene.
My kit
Currently, my most lightweight setup consists of a compact half-pan travel box, a set of sable travel brushes, some pencils and eraser, and an A5-size watercolour sketchbook filled with hot-pressed paper. Although I generally regard this more as an emergency backup kit for when time and space are limited, I find it ideal for short holidays, café sketching, countryside walks and short sketch sessions in towns and parks.
For extended painting trips I use a Mabef oil painters’ box, which I have adapted for watercolour by substituting the canvas panel holder inside the lid for a homemade paper holder. This two-piece device, hinged along one of the long sides with tape, fastens at top and bottom with metal clips; it takes a 71/2311in sheet of paper with a painting area of 73101/2in. When removed the painting has an attractive half-inch border on all four sides. I made a drawer on one side of the box that slides out to give quick access to my brushes and added a wooden cover with cut-outs to hold my paint
box and water container. As I like to paint standing up, I attached a metal mounting plate to the underside of the box, which allows it to be clipped onto a lightweight camera tripod.
With this setup I use a Craig Young brass Sketchers Box with Holbein tube colours, which although quite vivid and powerful, do mix together beautifully on the paper when applied wet-in-wet. I generally prefer a fairly conventional palette of colours of warm and cool primaries, earth colours and a few personal favourites such as light red, cadmium orange and cobalt violet.
For most purposes I use 140lb (300gsm) Saunders Waterford, Rough
or Not, but I usually carry a selection of papers such as Arches, Fabriano and Bockingford. I always include a few sticks of soft white Conté crayon in my pochade box. This serves the same purpose as masking fluid, that is to reserve areas of white paper before laying down a first wash, and it is quicker and far less fiddly to use. It can also be used retrospectively, to regain lost highlights when the painting is dry, safe in the knowledge that being chalk, the procedure will be fully reversible.
I carry a selection of paintbrushes: sable rounds and squirrel mops, and synthetic rounds, which have a good spring and keep their points well – perfect for tackling intricate areas and small architectural details. I also have a Chinese goat-hair brush, which is ideal for depicting natural forms such as trees and foliage. My box also contains a small plastic spray diffuser for rewetting my paints if they have become too dry, a couple of automatic pencils, a retractable eraser, a small multi tool with scissors and penknife (for cutting paper, scratching out highlights), a square of kitchen sponge (for water spillages) and small paint rag. The entire setup, including pochade box and tripod, fits into a medium-sized canvas backpack. I also carry with me a sketchbook and pencil.
Subject matter
When painting in a new location it often pays to spend time getting acquainted with your surroundings before settling down to paint. At historic landmarks and heritage sites it is natural to want to make directly for the most popular tourist areas but do remember that the most scenic views don’t necessarily make for the best subjects; painting is often just as effective when it deals with nature on a more personal, human scale.
Whatever the subject, before commencing it always pays to consider what the central theme of the painting is and what feeling or mood you are seeking to convey. Once determined, hold on to this throughout the painting process.
How I work
I generally start by sketching out the composition using a 2B pencil, adding dark accents here and there for small details, and sometimes even adding diagonal hatching to the shaded areas. I keep the drawing loose but accurate. Moving on to the painting stage, I mix up two or three pools of colour based around the primaries and, with a loaded brush, I lay down a variegated wash, working rapidly from top to bottom, adjusting the colour balance as I go. I work rapidly wet-into-wet, relying on surface tension and the grain of the paper to regulate the flow. My aim is to complete most of the painting in this first wash. I find this makes for a fresher appearance and reduces the need for over painting.
Unless you are very skilled in rendering buildings and architectural subjects, it may be advisable to avoid complex topographical views of towns and cities. Similarly, if time is short, complicated street views with people, cars and buildings are probably not ideal. On the other hand, effective sketching on location depends on the artist’s ability to summarise complex visual information with speed and confidence. To a large extent, this ‘shorthand’ approach is fundamental to watercolour and is what distinguishes it from other painting methods and techniques.
On sunny days, working from dark to light can add interest to plein-air sketches. I sometimes start with the shadow shapes then move on to the mid-tones and areas of local colour, leaving the brightest parts as untouched paper. With complicated scenes, or if short of time, it can be surprising how well a sketch will stand by painting the shadows alone.
It is useful to have a range of options in terms of technique and strategy for varying weather conditions, subject matter, time constraints and your state of mind. Sometimes the subject will require close observation and a controlled approach. At other times it may call for a more intuitive and fluid response. The key is to remain flexible, and tune in to the subject. That way, you can let the subject dictate how it needs to be painted.