Winter 04: 01/04/2023

This week I completed the second piece in Sellisternian's winter themed trio. You can catch up on last week's work here, the overall idea for Sellisternian here and my practice for this process here.

The finale pieces always have a lot going on so I was keen to get started. I started as usual, with an Imperial sheet of Fabriano Artistico 300gsm hot pressed watercolour paper, taped to an A1 canvas board. A graphite transfer of my digital sketch and details added in black Polychromos. As with all the finale pieces there's an acrylic element that needs to be gessoed at this stage, in this case the skull and skeletal hand toward the centre of the composition.

Before cracking out the fineliners I completed the acrylic skull, building up white, blue, yellow and buff titanium to suggest a snowy landscape. I added skeleton trees (ha get it) in dark blue before knocking them back a bit with white wax pastel and dots of paint for falling snow. The same colours went on the skeletal hand, minus the trees, starting warmer and ending in a cold bluish white at the fingertips.

On to lining and I added the now familiar magenta veins to the foliage and a vast wash of background pattern with red pen. I also added some blue liner in small areas of extreme shadow around the skeletal hand and leaves.

The muted pink acrylic ink went where you'd expect by now, across the background pattern and even on to the skin of the flesh hands. Distinct to this piece is the muted grey that I put on the pattern across the torso to help differentiate it from the background and skin without making it too overt and solid. This grey also went down in the stones within the jewellery circle to get them extra dark. The usual pyrrole red ink went on the three orbs, the fingertips and in the frame and jewellery elements.

On to watercolours for more of our tried and true winter palette! My heavily diluted yellow ochre/magenta mix went down over both the flesh hands and the torso. Pyyrole red reinforced the red orbs and then mixed with quinacridone gold for the jewellery and the frame held by the figure. The leaves were Amethyst highlighted with quin gold and teal. When it came to filling the background with Sodalite I put darker washes towards the bottom of the piece and around the skull towards the bottom of the frame being held. That needed plenty of time to dry ready for a finishing layer.

I used white gouache to extend the white branches along the leaves and against the background, as well as to put little stars in to the stones of the jewellery. Scarlet and yellow pencil enhanced the warmth and shape of the frame and jewellery while white wax pastel cooled the edges of the leaves. Scarlet pencil was also used on the finger tips and to add some expressive lines amongst the foliage. I used a payne's grey pencil to add a little shading under the leaves and around the skull and skeletal hand and crisp them up. A splash of gold gouache and winter is over!

I really like this piece, I think the frame and the skull give it a fun twist on the traditional portrait and looking at it reminds me of some of my favourite watercolour paints. It's nice to see them across a big area when watercolour painting is often done on a smaller scale. I'm going to be switching in to a very different palette for the Spring trio so I'll enjoy it while I can!

Meanwhile, in the big sketchbook.... In this pair of acrylic landscapes I wanted to make something actually pretty. Usually that's one of my lower priorities in this sketchbook but the emerging greenery outside had me feeling springy and I think that shows here.

I particularly like this round of Doodlebook doodlings. I love the little details and textures of the first and the unsettling mirrored composition of the last. I'm now actively thinking about how I would paint them as I draw and I find this very promising.

The bird song has started up again as we come out of winter so I reread another of the Book Of The... series. Surprise, it's the bird one! I love this one and always come away wanting to paint more birds. Another one to add to the To Do list with my grand landscape, still life and collage ambitions.

As the world leaves winter, so does Sellisternian. Next week I'll begin prepping for the Spring trio, the final trio! If that entry is up already I'll link it below, otherwise thanks for reading this early and have a great week!