Learn Beginner Painting Practice with Miniature Watercolor Studies

This is a post from Belinda Del Pesco’s Art Blog Belinda Del Pesco.

Learn Beginner Painting Practice with Miniature Watercolor Studies

Fear of the blank page is something artists have struggled with for all of history. What to paint while staring at all the potential – and the pressure – of the blank paper. Ease into learning painting as a beginner with miniature watercolor studies.

What genre to choose – still life, figurative, landscape?

Where to get reference materials? How to lay it out on the page, and what if drawing is a challenge too?

Out of Time

We smother ourselves with queries and uncertainty about how to start till we run out of painting time.

Life-obligations sneak in to lure with feelings of productivity, rather than staring at what we aren’t making at the art table. So, we go fold laundry or empty the dishwasher instead of making art.

The frustrating thing about this cycle is that we do this to ourselves.

No one else is pressuring us to use what is typically occasional painting time to crank out a masterpiece.

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Start Small

What if you shrink that blank paper? Instead of starting with a watercolor block that’s 11×14, try cutting or tearing a sheet of your favorite painting paper down to small, manageable squares.

If you have a variety of watercolor paper brands and weights, cut a pile of them and label the backs so you can test each of them with your pigments.

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Play with Your Paint

Do some warm ups on a small scale. Paint into petite watercolor paper swatches. Paint on wet paper, and dry paper. Drip, Smudge, Drag and Scumble with your pigments and brushes.

Brew some tea, and get yourself a cookie. Consider this reserved time with small painting a date night with your pigments. Get acquainted. Court each other. Be kind about it.

Start Small

After warming up with some loosey juicey color washes, tape down a few more of your favorite watercolor papers. Use reference photos from your phone to map out some shapes to guide your paint brush.

If it’s easier (it’s certainly faster) trace your photos onto the paper.

Print the images from your phone using a home printer. Make them small so they’ll fit the swatches of paper you prepped.

Use wax-free, erasable graphite transfer paper (like this stuff) behind your photo to trace (gently) the basic shapes of your image onto the watercolor paper. This will help you get started faster.

Let it Go

Another benefit of miniature watercolor studies is permission to let it go if your finished piece isn’t what you’d hoped for.

Since your work is small, it didn’t take as many hours as a large watercolor. Also, pay attention to that fact that you’ve actually been PRACTICING incrementally, rather than trying to churn out a huge masterpiece. Pat on the back for you!

You haven’t “wasted” art supplies, as these paper swatches and the paint on them are minimal.

Let’s pretend you’re dissatisfied with your tiny watercolor practice painting.

Since the work is small, you can slip it into a folder, or a magic drawer, and later – play with colored pencil or pastel on top of the watercolor for yet MORE practice. See? How cool is that? I knew you’d agree!

Have Courage

Fire your inner critic before you begin, and try a little direct painting. Instead of drawing first, use your brushes to lay in general shapes of your subject.

Give the paper a chance to dry – this is always a good experiment when you have several small paper swatches taped down to a support. You can flip through and paint on one swatch while the other is drying.

Drawing with a Brush

Another experiment you can try is drawing with your watercolor brush. In the image below, I’ve created a boundary with pencil, and applied a transparent layer of burnt sienna watercolor as a background field.

After that dried, I added a teeny drop of cad red to my burnt sienna well, and used a number 8 round brush tip to sketch a face.

Take a Breather

Letting each layer of watercolor dry before adding more, I continued refining details on the face, hair and background.

Sometimes, this approach – starting and stopping to work with assorted tiny practice watercolor paintings simultaneously forces us to Slow Down.

Pausing in the sometimes white knuckled process of painting to go add a layer to one of the other swatches gives our brains a breather.

That little break can leave enough room for an Ahah Moment of clarity in method or color or approach by the time you return to each little painting.

Brush Miles

The phrase brush miles refers to the amount of paint strokes it takes to truly practice painting. Each drag of your pigment loaded brush against paper adds to your accumulated miles, and brings you new layers of skill.

Aim for brush miles, rather than mastery. Focus on the joy of creating, instead of the pressure of perfection. Search for tiny advancements in your practice, and praise your growth, as well as your effort.

Talk to yourself with encouragement, rather than criticism. Use the same voice on yourself that you’d modulate to encourage a grandchild learning to tie a shoelace. There is no elevator to make you a better painter, so you’ll have to take the stairs.

Thanks for stopping by, and I’ll see you in the next post -

Belinda

P.S. If you’re looking for tips to duct tape the mouth of your inner critic, maybe this book will help: Your Inner Critic is a Big Jerk & other truths about being creative.

Art Quote

It is essential for you to remember that the attention you give to any action should be in due proportion to its worth, for then you won’t tire and give up, if you aren’t busying yourself with lesser things beyond what should be allowed.

Marcus Aurelius

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