Action!

This was the subject at the latest Avon Valley Artists session when once again I failed to take my camera, not deliberate I hasten to add. I was annoyed with myself at this latest lapse. 

There were fifteen members present and the subject lent itself  to a wide variety of interpretations. I can only show you mine but I'm sure you will see Yvonnes on her website. www.floralwatercolours.blogspot.com/   Her painting, very accomplished as usual, is of dandelion heads with the seeds floating away as they do.

This is the painting below in monochrome. After getting a mild slap on the wrist over the lack of darks (value) in my original Iris painting  I thought it might be of interest to publish monochrome versions of the paintings. The biggest problem in assessing value in colour is that what you might think is dark isn't necessarily so, or probably better described as applying values to colours. I hope this will prove of interest.

`Gotcha'! 16" x 12" Fabriano Artistico Extra White 140lb (300 gsm) Not

I'm unable to show the original photograph for copyright reasons but will describe it. Essentially it was similar in composition to the finished painting but with a solid black background and a large number of water splashes at the bottom part, which show up well against the dark colour. I decided to ignore this and go for a colourful approach heavily influenced by the Dutch master Gerard Hendriks, who I am pleased to call a friend. 

I first made a  pencil drawing, paying particular attention to the head but with only a basic outline for the rest. The intention was to make an impressionistic and colourful image of the bird, having caught a small fish, rising from the river. There is an element of abstraction and could be described as my take on the `Realistic Abstract' theme of Keest van Aalst. 

With the glorious colours of the Kingfisher  my colourist tendencies were given full reign. I painted the head first of all and did this with the small Isabey retractables. The colours are as described later except the eye was Ivory Black (Maimeri). The orange is principally Transparent Orange (Schminke PO71), a glorious colour, and although it isn't obvious there are also touches of Transparent Brown (Schminke PBr41) in the darker areas. The blue is mostly Turquoise (Lukas PB16) with some Cerulean. This Lukas colour is another star. The background colours allowed to mix on the paper, include Transparent Orange, Transparent Brown, Cerulean, Cobalt Teal Blue (DS PG50), purples mixed from Quinacridone Rose (Graham PV19) and Ultramarine Blue, Hansa Yellow Medium (DS PY97). I think that's it! I also splashed the same colours directionally to give the impression of the bird rising from the water. Finally, although not very evident. I splashed Vallejo Acrylic Gouache, slightly diluted, over the bottom area near the bird. This is useful stuff but beware - very messy!

My brushes were restricted to the Escoda and Isabey  Kolinsky retractables sizes 4,6, 8 and 12.

More on the Prischedkos

The amount of interest in the two pieces I did on Viktoria and Slawa Prischedko has been considerable and they are amongst the top posts in terms of page reads. The Moulin de Perrot Academy of Fine Arts www.mdperrot.com/  is once again hosting both Viktoria and Slawa for a workshop entitled `Watercolor: shadows and light in watercolor' between July 29 and August 3rd. They are previouly teaching at Atelier-artimage, Dustal, France between July 15 - 21 with the same workshop title. On the Atelier site are two splendid galleries of their paintings www.Atelier-artimage.com  Unfortunately, like their website, you cannot download the paintings as some sort of block is in place.  The Prischedkos gallery is www.prischedko.de/ ADDED 11/11/2019: For the last two years the Prischedkos have been at East Devon Arts at Sidmouth, Devon. England conducting workshops.

 Slawa in centre with Viktoria next to him.

Viktoria will teach landscapes outside and in the studio and Slawa portraiture in the studio. Interestingly Viktorias class is in French with simultaneous translation into English. Slawas is in German with translation into French and English. Viktoria was born in Moravia and Slawa the Ukraine. Both are graduates of the Art Academy of Kiev. Slawa has his own teaching academy and both have featured in many exhibitions and belong to several art organisations. They are considered two of the leading watercolour artists, although previously little known outside Europe.

Moulin de Perrot list the materials Viktoria uses which I will detail again. For paper she uses Hahnemuhle 600g ("Moulin du Coq")  50 x 60cm. It says `this is not a regular product'(?)  Brushes are Da Vinci Nos 12, 14, 20 and 30. I presume these are the Cosmotop series and could be either the Spin round series 5580 or the Mix B round series 5530. The 5580 is a synthetic brush while the 5530 is a mixture of sable, squirrel and fitch combined with synthetic. Ken Bromley www.artsupplies.co.uk/ sells a heavy Hahnemuhle paper that could well be the one Viktoria uses, and Jacksons www.jacksonsart.co.uk/ sell the Cosmotop series. Also listed are Schlepper No 6 or 8. These latter are what we know as riggers.

Despite the amazing colour effects she gets in her paintings her palette is listed as (only!) lemon yellow, green yellow, transparent orange, perylene violet, french ultramarine and indigo blue. It has previously been said that these are a mix of Schminke and `Russian', presumably St. Petersburg/White Nights. Looking at her paintings I imagine the transparent orange is the Schminke colour that Jean Haines is ecstatic about in her latest book. The pigment (PO71 pyrrole orange) was until recently unique to Schminke, but Lukas are now offering a Permanent Orange which is the same pigment. Schminke is available from Jacksons and Lukas Great Art www.greatart.co.uk/  and Lawrence www.lawrence.co.uk

 The portraits are all by Slawa although I wonder if this one might be by Viktoria? It looks like her signature.

Slawas tecnique is different to Viktorias. Apparently he doesn't do any preliminary drawing for his portraits and, unlike Viktoria, paints in layers. I cannot find any information about his materials. I assume they may be different but who knows? They are both fabulous artists and it is a pity neither appear to have written any books nor made videos. can we live in hope?