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Saturday, January 31, 2015


An Evening with Kay Le Poidevin


 

Kay started the evening by announcing she wasn't going to paint one picture for us but three! This was because she always works on several pictures at once as she allows washes to dry thoroughly each time to preserve the luminosity of the watercolours.

She also changes the water frequently and uses large brushes. The paper she prefers is Saunders Waterford which is a rag based paper and can take many washes.

Her subjects were scenes of the Solent.

After first wetting the paper Kay put on washes of aureolin and rose madder on two boards spreading the colours out with a large brush each time. When these were dry cobalt blue was washed into the sky and then burnt sienna added to produce grey rain clouds. The horizon line was drawn with a grey watercolour pencil and the painted in with  ultramarine, burnt sienna and quinacridone violet.

Different details were then added to produce two different pictures one with Calshot Spit and the other with a shinglebank and the Island. Colours were removed using water to produce light tones and deeper tones added with more paint. Building, channel markers and chimneys were placed as silhouettes to give drama to the scenes.    

After the break Kay started to work on a previously prepared Saunders Waterford paper which she had covered with washes of Windsor yellow, quinacridone magenta and Windsor violet over ultramarine and burnt sienna and left to dry. Kay then started to remove areas of paint with water, a stiff brush and paper towel to produce light areas in the painting. It is thought that Turner used this technique for some paintings.

She then put in details of cliffs and added a moon and moonlight using naples yellow. Dark areas of clouds were emphasised with dark blues. The lifting technique was used to paint a lighthouse and it's beams.

Kay during her demonstration had introduced us to some unusual watercolour methods as well as emphasising some basic ones and gave us an instructive and valuable evening . We were very grateful to her for this and for standing in at such short notice.  

 The two acrylic workshops take place next Saturday 7th February from 10am to 4pm. in the Palm Room.

Members attending should have instruction sheets of what to bring from Di. Time to start getting prepared now!     
Solent View 2
Solent View 1



Basic Picture


Finished Picture
Kay with her final painting

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