Magic of Black Week 6; Imagine and Experiment

This last challenge in the series is to use your imagination to make a story drawing and/or to experiment further with materials, perhaps using them together as in the image above.

Before this series of challenges using black paper I had hardly used interference watercolours but had used some metallics. As you can see in the sampler above they can almost appear like stain glass windows when separated by small areas of black. You may like to design your own window or paint a bird with iridescent wings.

To draw the jellyfish the upper part was drawn first and the bright base where the tentacles attach. The tentacles were then drawn with a very relaxed arm to produce a smooth and fluid line. It is best to practice this first. To prime a Posca pen the first time it is used, or during the drawing process if it does not flow freely; just shake the pen to mix the paint then press the nib down gently on a spare piece of paper. The nib will retract into the barrel. Release the pressure. If necessary repeat till ink seeps into the nib and the ink flows freely again. Always shake the pen first before using.

In the sea anemone drawing look at how opaque the paint pens are and how when dry layers of different colours can be built up. This is a rather cartoon like/decorative piece but it helped me find out how the different colours could work together. These pens are excellent for making areas of flat colour as well as for line and small bright marks like dots.

The dandelion head is made with soft coloured pencils and is an easy exercise to try which I cannot take credit for. Choose a fairly smooth black paper to work on. Simply draw the stalk with a white, a pale yellow green and a brown pencil. Lightly mark out a circle with its centre where the stalk ends. Lightly draw a yellow green area at the centre before drawing lines mostly in white radiating outwards. Start each stroke at the centre easing of the pressure toward the edge of the seed head. These lines should vary in length some ending only a short distance from the centre and others extending to the edge. Then the little white “stars” can be added with fast short strokes. Adjust the colour with a little yellow green or brown in places and there is your dandelion clock!

For the sea dragon which is related to the seahorse, a white pastel pencil was used to draw a feint outline which was drawn into with a pale cream pastel before picking the features out with an iridescent soft pastel.

In the image above some areas were worked with thinly rubbed in soft pastel. A little line work in white ink was then applied before going in with oil pastel. Again the iridescent oil pastel was used as the final sparkle.

Hope you have enjoyed the last six weeks challenges and that working on black paper has been a fun and exciting way to experiment with different media.

Your Paintings;