Testing New Watercolor Papers from Hahnemühle!

I recently received a new paper to try out from Hahnemühle USA, the Harmony 140 lb. cold pressed block. The best way I know of to test new paper is to put it through all the paces -- heavy washes, lifting, masking fluid, and other forms of abuse that I inflict upon my paper in the course of creating a painting. Here's a step by step tutorial of my koi painting, and a review of the paper in the process.

The Harmony 140 lb CP watercolor block from Hahnemuehle. 

Here's my drawing of koi with masking fluid protecting parts of the paper. I also outlined the koi with a thin line of masking fluid to allow me to work the background really wet and control the flow of water better. The masking fluid reserves the white of the paper, and the thin outline helps to keep my heavy wet washes from running out of control.

I used a variety of dark colors for the backgound, and a lot of palette mud, too. You can see from the puddles and sheen how wet the paper still is at this point. While the paper was still damp, I splashed a few drops of water onto it to create a few tiny spots of blooms. 

Next I painted my lightest values on the fish, the yellow colors. Notice my background wash is still wet -- I used a lot of water!

Here I added my medium values to the koi, namely the orange and red colors -- cadmiums, vermillion, quinacrodone rose, violet, and a little sepia for the darks. Notice how light the background appears in this photo, compared to the previous photo? That's because it is now dry. I used a lot of water to create the background, and the more water you use, the lighter the watercolor paints will dry. Adding water to watercolor paint is akin to adding white paint to oils or acrylics -- it lightens the colors. 

More dark values are added using ivory black, sepia, indigo, and violet to create form and roundness to the fish. The masking fluid comes off easily, revealing perfectly preserved paper on which I can now paint.  

The koi have a freckled appearance to them, which I added with my darkest colors of ivory black. I scrubbed and lifted some areas that I had previously painted, to show some of the lighter patterns in the fish's colors.  

And finally, this is my finished painting of the koi. 

The Harmony paper from Hahnemuehle responded beautifully, and held up perfectly despite my abusive painting techniques. It naturally buckled under my heavy washes, but then dried flat. I really gave it a workout and didn't expect it to perform as well as it did, and I was pleasantly surprised that the paper far exceeded all of my expectations. The texture is quite nice, slightly toothy. The paper is surface sized and the amount of sizing appears to be quite generous, giving that the amount of water that I used and the lifting techniques all worked quite well. The color is soft white -- not overly bright, but no hint of any yellow or cream color. 

This paper is new, and is currently available at Art Materials Online. It will be available at other retailers soon. 

Keep up with all of Hahnemuehle latest products by following them on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. 

Plein Air Painting in Calella de Palafrugell, Spain!

I haven't posted in a few weeks because I've been too busy teaching a plein air painting workshop for French Escapade Tours in Costa Brava, Spain! My students and I stayed in the gorgeous little historic fishing village of Calella de Palafrugell, and painted the Mediterranean Sea, the medieval villages, the quaint fishing boats, the beautiful Spanish gardens, and more. I'm still catching my breath! Next year I'm teaching a workshop in Provence, but I loved this location so much that I'm going to teach a workshop here again in 2019.  

Calella de Palafrugell

Students in Annie Strack's Plein Air Workshop 

More views to paint!

Fishing boats on the beach in Calella de Palafrugell

We had the town pretty much to ourselves the whole time!

I fell in love with the boats in Calella de Palafrugell

Gorgeous views at every turn

The weather was perfect, and my students and I had the place all to ourselves

More new paintings, again!

December is getting off to the busy start, with classes filling up and lots of new bookings for workshops and demos. Still, I've managed to find a little time to paint for myself, in between the myriad of holiday parties and travel. I just finished this watercolor painting of dinghies, from a reference photo I took on one of my recent trips to St. John. I love the water in the Caribbean -- it's as warm and inviting as it looks! I'll be entering this painting in competitions this year, and hopefully the judges will like it as much as I.

Destiny Awaits, 14x20 watercolor

This floral is a demo from one of my classes in my studio. I have several stems of silk flowers and an assortment of vases, and every now and then I arrange them for a still-life painting exercise for my students. It's a wonderful break from painting from photographs, and I can rearrange the flowers and lighting to give my students some different experiences in colors, compositions, designs, and values. This one is on Arches rough paper, and painted with my Mission pan watercolors. I used squirrel mop bushes, which combined with the rough paper helps to give it a looser feel.

Floral Demo with Mission Watercolors

Last week, I drove down to Rehoboth Beach for the Delaware Watercolor Society's holiday party. They gave all the artists a cute little apron with their logo on it, and the Signature Members received an additional gift of a lovely tote bag. I'm always toting bags of stuff around, so a new tote bag always comes in handy!

Signature Member gifts from the Delaware Watercolor Society

More new paintings and demos from Plein Air Brandywine Valley festival!

The last couple of weeks I've been busy with the Plein Air Brandywine Valley festival. The event kicked off with a reception for the artists at the Marshallton Inn, where everyone received their welcome packets with the event schedule and artist info, and swag bags full of wonderful goodies donated by our generous sponsors. Artists started painting the very next morning and continued for four days. We started the week off by painting at farms and estates in the Greenville, Delaware area on Monday, then Marshallton, Pennsylvania on Tuesday (including a Quick Draw event!), then Chesapeake City, Maryland on Wednesday (followed by a Nocturne painting event), and finished up back in Delaware on Thursday. On Friday, we hung the show at Winterthur and the paintings were judged by Steve Doherty, editor of Plein Air Magazine and prizes were awarded during a gala reception. 

I demonstrated landscape painting using Mission Gold Watercolors provided by Martin F. Weber Fine Art Products on both Saturday and Sunday for visitors enjoying the exhibit at Winterthur.  

Painting away in Chesapeake City. Busy Bridge, 5x7 watercolor on canvas, SOLD. 

I finished 8 paintings during the event, and sold 3 of them before the paint was dry. 

Me, with Steve Doherty after the judging. As one of the event organizers, my paintings were not included in the judging, but I did get to participate in all the events and sold several paintings! 

another new painting!

Here's my latest watercolor painting! I just finished this one, and sent the image off to the National Watercolor Society for jurying. Wish me luck! I've been recovering from surgery for the past month, and spent the time in my studio working on the complexities of this painting. I'm writing a step by step tutorial using this painting, and soon I'll post the link to where you can find that free tutorial. Many thanks to my friends on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter who come to my rescue and help me with the titles for my latest paintings!

A Tug at My Heart, 20x14 watercolor 

 More sponsorships are rolling in for Plein Air Brandywine Valley! We are now up to thirteen Merit Awards of fabulous merchandise and gift certificates, including the latest from Vasari Oil Colors. Vasari oils are completely hand made of the finest oil and pigments and made in the US. Two lucky artists will win $250 Gift Certificates from Vasari, who has also generously provided two $100 Gift Certificates to be used as awards in the Quick Draw and the Nocturne painting competitions!

Merit Awards provided by Vasari Oil Colors

Painting en Plein Air at Fontainebleu Park!

I just got back from a trip to New Orleans where I taught a watercolor painting workshop for the West Bank Art Guild. I had a fabulous trip, although I had to dig out from Winter Storm Jonah before I left home. I had a great group of artists in my workshop, and I'll post some photos of that next week! After the workshop, I spent some time visiting with old friends and getting in a little painting en plein air.

(Carol Hallock painting the beach  with oils at Fontainebleu.)

 I stayed at my dear friend Carol Hallock's home on Bayou Lacombe while I was down there. I used to live in Lacombe years ago, and Carol and I are old painting buddies. We both pursue the same subjects in our paintings, although she prefers to paint with oils while I usually reach for watercolors.

(Mary Monk using soft pastels to paint Fontainebleu beach.)

 It was nice to catch up with Mary Monk while I was in town! Mary is an old friend, and stayed at my house while she was painting in the Plein Air Brandywine Valley competition last year. She's always a lot of fun to hang out with!

(Carol Hallock, Mary Monk, and Annie Strack painting en plein air at Fontainebleu State Park.)

 I painted two small watercolors en plein air while we were at Fontainebleu State Park, on the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain. It was foggy when we got there, and the fog lifted and the light changed dramatically. We stayed out painting until sunset, and I shot some fantastic photos of the changing light to use for studio paintings later!

Fontainebleu Beach, 6x12 watercolor $79.

Fontainebleu Park, 6x12 watercolor $79.

It was a busy couple of weeks and I'm still not caught up with my studio paintings, new painting courses, and other work. I've also been inundated with requests for workshop proposals -- I'm getting those out as fast as I can, and so if you've just sent me a request you can expect to hear back within 2 days. I'm adding new workshops to the Calender Page of this website all the time, so be sure to check back often to see the latest listings. Workshops sell out quickly, so if you see one you like, you need to jump on it and register before it's sold out!

Art Tip: How to paint a Sunset

One of my most popular 1-day workshop subjects is "How to Paint Skies." I teach my students how to paint a variety of different atmospheric conditions in skies, such as different types of clouds, sunny weather, rainy skies, stormy skies, fog, etc. My students always enjoy painting sunsets, which are the most difficult because of the multiple colors introduced to the wash.

The most common mistake that watercolor painters make, is layering colors or letting the wrong colors mix on the paper, resulting in the odd colors. For instance, both yellow and blue can be found in the sky during a sunset, but if the yellow and blue are layered or mixed on the paper they will result in green -- a color that is not found in the sky.

(Sunset, 9x12 WC, $125)

The second biggest mistake artists make when painting sunsets, is not painting the colors in the order of the color spectrum. The colors in a sunset (or sunrise) follow the same spectrum order as the colors in a rainbow. The color closest to the Sun is yellow, the next color is orange, then red, with violet being the color that appears furthest from the light source. The sky might be dark blue or light blue depending on the position of the Sun. Values will also deepen as they get further from the light source, with the lightest value being the light source, itself.

The third mistake artists make, is not realizing that sunset colors only appear on clouds. The sky doesn't reflect the colors -- the colors are reflected on particles of water, which is why the colors appear on the clouds.

In this demonstration painting, I started by painting a wet-on-wet blue wash for the sky, and blotted out the edges of the clouds. Then, starting with the Sun's position in the center of the horizon, I used yellow ochre and worked my way outward using cadmium orange, permanent red, and dioxide violet. Some of the colors overlapped each other, which is fine because the overlapping colors are analogous so the order of the color spectrum is still maintained. A few more cloud layers were blotted out while the colors were still wet. To create the reflection in the water, I did the same thing but without the blotting, and I kept the water movement horizontal in appearance.

I teach this in workshops pretty often, so keep an eye out for a workshop near you!

$99 Paintings!

All the paintings on this page are only $99! Free shipping to U.S. addresses, international shipping available for an additional cost. Paintings do not include any frames or mats. New work is added to this page often, but these sell pretty fast so if you see one you like, email me right away to purchase it!

Janssen's Pumpkins, 5x7 oil on board

Brandywine Battlefield, 6x12 watercolor

Vineyard Drive, 5x7 oil on board

Poinsettia, 6x9 watercolor 

Stormy Marsh, 5x8 watercolor

Fontainebleau Beach, 6x12 watercolor

Fontainebleau State Park, 6x12 watercolor 

Kuerner Farm II, 6x12 watercolor

Kuerner Farm I, 6x12 watercolor

Pt. Pinos Lighthouse, 5x8 watercolor

Beaches, 5x7 watercolor on board

Shoshone River Mountains, 5x8 watercolor

St. Croix dinghies, 5x8 watercolor

Lake Road, Lacombe, 5x8 watercolor

Kuerner Farm Springhouse, 5x8 watercolor

Fredrick's Pond, 5x7 oil on canvas board

Marshall Square Park, 5x7 oil on board

Everhart Park Bridge, 5x7 oil on board

Shoshone River, 5x8 watercolor

Trunk Bay Beach, St. John, USVI, 5x8 watercolor

Wilmington Skyline, 5x7 oil on  board

Tchefuncte River, 5x8 watercolor

Haskell's Barn, 5x8 watercolor

Yellow Water Lilies, 5x7 oil on canvas panel

Seagulls, 5x8 watercolor

Merchant of Menace, 5x7 oil on panel

Pond's Edge, 5x7 oil on panel

Dover Door, 7x5 oil