In an extract from her fifth book for Crowood Press, LIZ CHADERTON gives you the confidence and skills to paint lively, contemporary faces and characters in line and wash
LINE AND WASH is where painting and drawing meet, combining the strengths of each medium in one piece of art. It is a wonderful mix of media to capture a speedy and dynamic portrait of your muse. The lines define the contours of the features and perhaps areas of distinct tone within the face, while the watercolour washes add emotion and tone. I believe it is at its best when the sum of the ink and washes adds up to more than the constituent parts by exploiting the strengths of each. If you aspire to paint more loosely in watercolour, the reassurance of the line can help you work more freely with the washes which adds energy and expression to the portrait.
Working on a traditional white paper can make your portrait appear quite stark, whereas working on a toned paper brings coherence and depth to the painting. Whether you use a warm skin hue, or something more unexpected.
Strathmore Toned Tan or Toned Gray mixed media paper is perfect for this approach. It is a smooth heavy paper which can take watercolour washes well without buckling. However, it is only available in tan or grey; if you are using a lightbox for transferring your image, it is not transparent and you cannot lift the background colour to regain highlights. For these reasons, I suggest toning your paper with a flat wash to your desired hue and tone.
In the name of clarity, I haven’t got a clue who this chap is. His. The image is straight from Pixabay, chosen because I liked his hand and he is royalty-free. If you would like to have a go at painting him, you can find him here: tinyurl.com/bdhzfrfb ▶
1 THE PAPER AND WASH
I do not stretch my paper, but simply tape it down and paint with it propped up at a slight angle, so I can predict the flow of the water. I prepared my palette of Quinacridone Sienna, Quinacridone Gold, Sap Green, Perylene Maroon and Transparent Grey. I like to mix paints to a milky consistency so that I am ready to respond quickly to any magic happening on the surface. I mixed a large thin wash of Perylene Maroon with a touch of Sienna, to make a warm salmon colour. Do test it on a scrap of paper to make sure it is not too deep a tone and add more water if needed. I am aiming for it to be about a third of the way along an imaginary tonal strip: a dark light tone or light mid-tone. With a large brush, I apply as flat a wash as possible and allow
