Caroline started off this demonstration by instructing us to soak our watercolour paper for 5 to 10 minutes. She also stated that she used a size 12 watercolour brush and a rigger. She recommended 300 g watercolour paper taped down in order to stop the wrinkling of the paper. You could use it at an angle to encourage drips or flat.
She started painting very pale red in the form of flowers. With the wetness of the Paper it gave it a soft result. Once this was completed, she added a purple to the red and then added this warmer colour to the inside of the flowers. She also added water underneath the flower to encourage dripping and spreading. She then worked with yellow ochar for the tops of the flowers. The paper was dry at the top so she was able to get harder edges.
She mixed her Emerald green with yellow to give a light green which she painted in the stems. She added a bit of red to darken it and continued varying the greens. she added drips to the greens as well. She stated that if you wanted to take out some of the colour you could do so by blotting. You can use masking fluid initially if you wish or to add gouache which is non-transparent. She said no to the use of the watercolour eraser as it takes the top coat off the paper and reduces the luminosity.
She then went over the dried flowers with quinacrine pink and a alizare crimson to draw in the flower shapes and bring the dark forward. For the centre she will not use black but combines green red and ultra marine blue for a soft black which she painted in the centre bits of the flowers.
Someone asked how you would put in the background colour at this point. She indicated that you would just wet the paper around the flowers and container and then drop in the background colour which she used as magenta and a deeper purple for shadows.
