Canoe in the Rapids by Winslow Homer

As a watercolourist, Winslow Homer was an early influence. I was greatly inspired by his “Canoe in the Rapids” for it’s clarity, effect and equally in the casual, informal appeal.

Underlying the watercolour there’s a line drawing. This is well defined for the canoe and canoeists, although Homer only made some indicative marks to guide his hand for the water and sky.  He may have gone straight to watercolour for many of the landscape effects. Notice how simple the colours are: mainly blue-green gray and just a touch of brown. In effect, it’s almost a monochrome painting. Here we have a classic central balance – there is no mistaking the focus of this picture.  A simple, clearly conceived composition, adroitly drawn and masterfully executed.

You’re transported there…….wait!……where are we?……in a following canoe?……we’d better start paddling!

The Value of Values

Previously, I proposed a couple of drawing exercises: gesture, and contiguous contour drawing. An important third aspect of drawing (and painting) is value and creating believable lights and darks! It’s great fun to form shapes entirely with with lights and darks: placing darker areas behind light and vice-versa (forming the boundary rather than drawing it).

In the following video I summarize the power of simple value blocking:

Yes, it can be that simple with 3 value zones:

Value Studies from a mid-tone

Here’s a great way to approach tonal studies which works really well in charcoal. It’s perhaps the most painterly way of drawing and the process translates easily into painting. It almost deserves its own category: neither drawing, nor painting, it’s rendering. It’s at the core of many pastels and paintings for example, and in this video I start by using some nice messy charcoal:

 

 

Here’s the same idea applied to a portrait (sped up this time):

 

Method

I begin with a mid-tone application of uncompressed charcoal – lightly rubbing charcoal all over my drawing surface, using the side of the twig. Don’t try compressed charcoal, which sticks to the paper a good deal more and is difficult to erase. I then pull out lights with a kneadable eraser (a must – I don’t think I have any square erasers anymore). I focus on the large shapes and relationship of forms in blocks of light. There’s typically a scary stage where nothing seems to be happening and then….Oh! there’s a ghosted image – faint but real. In portraits, the effect is a bit like the Shroud of Turin.

Now I switch to pushing in darks and then work away with charcoal on the darkest areas – again, shapes and not lines, with blocks of light and dark. When you see shapes, you’re creating a jigsaw puzzle, distinct and separate from the subject and this always works the eye rather than the brain – the brain typically being the bad guy: over-thinking, making assumptions and judging.

As if by magic, there’s an image, which only then do I reinforce with some line. An image built out of just 3 values: light, mid-tone and dark, set on a ground of mid-tone and quite unlike those pencil sketches which most are accustomed to.

It’s a technique so alien to many, but the light goes on and some find it a revelation. When I first encountered the approach, I almost felt it was cheating!

 

Value Studies in Watercolour

What’s good for dry media is equally good for watercolour. It’s well worth the discipline to use a single (tonal) colour to form an image – plus it’s a great way to try out those watercolours. Follow the same approach as with my circle to sphere video and leaving the light areas bare, block in the mid tones first (over the areas that are going to be mid- tone and dark) and then add in the darks onto that block of mid tone. Oh, it’s OK to draw a little first!

The two-puddle system

Should you be new to watercolour this is an excellent way to get started:

1. Lightly draw the forms of the subject you are going to describe:
2. Put out two puddles of paint on a mixing palette;
3. Test the first on a scrap of paper and adjust the amount of paint until it covers as a mid-tone;
4. Make the second puddle as dark as you can – whilst still being able to fill your brush;
5. On your paper, form the mid-tone areas from the first puddle, wait until almost dry then add in your darks to the mid-tone paint. “Voila!”- you have a value study!
6. For this watercolour study you can use either watercolour paper or drawing paper, the idea being to apply clear blocks of value – don’t worry should the paper buckle a little.

This will work well with a neutral dark grey, blue or brown. Here are a couple of value studies in watercolour, using a single colour, the first in Paynes grey and the second with Burnt Sienna, dulled with a little ultramarine blue.

Exercise

1. Take a couple of references of your choice or from the Reference Gallery and develop a couple of studies starting from a mid-tone as above.
2. Next, try a watercolour study using the same general process: light, mid-tone and dark using a single pigment, this time starting from white paper, blocking in mid-tone and then dark.
3. Look back to the Homer watercolour from time to time to see how he has formed the water and hills in this very same way!

 

Drawing and wash

One idea that repeats throughout art (as it does elsewhere in life) is the juxtaposition of two equally-weighted opposites…a combination that very often naturally reinforces and emphasizes the qualities of both.

Explore the juxtaposition of the sharp definition of line and the ephemeral, amorphous quality of wash. The key is to let one complement the other, generally letting the wash pass behind or in front – it does not matter. Try not to stop wash exactly at the line, thereby reinforcing a boundary. This is a great way of adding something to most drawings.

In the following video, I focus on drawing as the prime medium, adding some wash to enhance:

Try some ink!

Ink is my preferred medium for line and can be applied before or after the wash. Using a permanent, light-fast pen, the effect is often very similar and the choice is as much about how the artist evolves the image as the intent. I would say that most drawings can benefit from a little wash – there again, I’m a painter at heart!

Here are some great tips for Line and wash: https://www.arttutor.com/blog/201512/tips-painting-line-wash

Exercise

1. Take a drawing that you are not completely happy with and apply a little wash.
2. If you like the result, and I think you will, develop your next drawing and include some wash!

Cross Hatching:

Cross Hatching: Drawing Technique for Beginners