As I sit here writing this
article there are 6 watercolor paintings slowly drying. Unfortunately,
one painting looks a complete mess. While the others are bright and
clear, this one has a muddy-colored pool that could result in a total
disaster. This is water dealing its mixed blessings.
What can be done to rescue the situation? Fortunately, this is nothing
new. Instead of being worried about the disaster unfolding there is one
question that should be asked…
“Could the finished
painting end up being better than expected?”
When painting watercolors it is often better to leave things alone.
Wait until it is dry and see what happens. Interfering with the natural
drying process of watercolors often does more damage than good. When
you have experienced this kind of situation many times before, it gives
you a new confidence… the dull muddy pool may have the right
ingredients to combine into dynamic colors that you couldn‘t plan for.
Guess what… the painting was a wonderful surprise. The final colors
that the muddy pool produced were incredible… ranging from blues,
bright reds and yellows through to greens, rich maroons, browns and
grays.
The most pleasing thing of all is that, apart from clean water, the
only watercolor paints used were Ultramarine Blue, Cadmium Yellow and
Magenta.
Could you ask for more? If you are prepare to let your watercolor
paintings paint themselves, the worst thing to happen is that you throw
the failures away with the trash. So… the best idea is to leave your
paintings for a few days. You never know… you might see a little
something extra special that you hadn’t seen before.
