The Light of the Moon

This lesson is actually  about sunrise or sunset, and all the wonderful cloud effects of those times of day.  I don't happen to have any sunset paintings for examples, so this nighttime view of trees against the Sound, the far Olympic Penninsula and a night sky will have to do. 

The basic techniques...top to bottom, light to dark and back to front puts the painting together.  Instead of vivid background sky, I just used a "manganese? blue, went around some star spaces which I softened later with a scrubber brush and dropped water into the moon shape so it would bleed out.  When all was dry, I started laying in the foreground...working with a light lunar black and lunar blue combination and waiting until all was dry to do the darker forground...note, that I put a little sap green in with the lunar black in the closest tree.

Lesson 3, CandP watercolor lessons 11/10/09

1. Review and look at work.   Discuss complementary colors.....Demo how they work. Review graded washes.
...re-read 86-89

3.  New students....do graded washes on 1/8 paper.  Cool color on top, warm color  on bottom, 2nd paper, vice versa .
#1. Cobalt blue or pale pthalo  on top, raw sienna on bottom. Leave some unpainted areas for clouds. and let the color blend imperceptibly toward the middle (barely any color in the middle) show examples.
#2 a pthalo blue or cobalt on bottom and a pale auroelin yellow on top. Blend imperceptibly toward the middle. 

Pick out three gourds  and  sketch them, overlapping, on a piece of bond paper which is the same FORMAT as your watercolor paper.  Think of the negative space. Show Garret’s example   Do your designing on tissue paper (quickly!) and draw hard on the back to trace VERY LIGHTlY onto your cobalt blue and raw sienna paper.  Paint the entire gourds with a medium wash of Auroelin or raw sienna yellow.  Develop the gourds step by step, always thinking of where the light hits and the shadows appear. (In this case I used a little cobalt violet (transparent) and lunar black (granulated for the shadows...)

On the #2 paper,  create some “sunset” or sunrise clouds in the yellow sky with some soft alizarin crimson and purple ( mix alizarin crimson and pthalo blue or cobalt blue  to make purple). work wet with this part, then let dry while you work on your gourds  and put in a bluish mountain range toward the bottom  (read page 88 and 89)  Work back and forth between #1 and #2

3.  Old hands.. Sunrise or sunset? You choose.   Again, demonstrate how you can match value “tabs”
 
Read all through before you start.
 Wash one entire 1/4 sheet in pale auroelin yellow

  On  a smaller piece of WC paper, do some cloud studies while you wait for the bigger sheet to dry. Do #1with an orange and greenish  sky and the setting sun behind the clouds. (see page 86 and my example ....You can substitute a light value of alizarin crimson for rose madder)

 Do #2 with daylight clouds  with the sun behind the clouds.  Pay special attention to the shapes of the clouds as they recede in space, and the color of their “ragged” edges....look at values...use your tabs. Squint damnit! 

Think about the negative space (sky) and where the light is coming from (in this case behind the clouds), and how the sky seems to lighten as it goes down to the horizon. Soften some of the edges of the clouds while the paint is wet, and be sure to keep in mind that clouds seem to "flatten" on the bottom and become more narrow as they move away from you.

For the bigger sheet covered in auroelin yellow wash.  Pg. 88-89

Think of gazing either east (sunrise) or west (sunset) through a landscape of trees and far away hills or mountains.  In both, the color would be warmer and more intense at the edge of land.  What steps would you take ( write them down if it helps) to evoke the fierce exultation of the sun rising on a cold winter morning through the bare trees?  Or, the bittersweet end of a winter day as the sun disappears behind the mountains and casts the tree skeletons into sharp relief?  Think how the long shadows cast by early or late sun can “marry” the trees and their bases to the land ( and show the curves of the land as they are cast in long bars across the ground)  Remember, shadows are TRANSPARENT and usually COOL.

Work as quickly and as emotionally as you can, using large brushes until the end.  You have the information and techniques to do this now.  Be Brave.  Be Bold.  Go to the edge of your comfort level and if the work  doesn’t turn out, you can always do something else on the back.  Try to finish in this class session.  If it ends up somewhat abstract, that’s cool.  Like the poem below, "Make big shadows"
If you have to wait for an area to dry, work on your night landscape or try some more clouds or tree shapes on your scrap paper.

And here is one of my favorite poems .......

You, sent out beyond your recall,

go to the limits of your longing.

Flare up like flame and make big shadows.

Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.

Just keep going.  No feeling is final.

  Marie Ranier Rilke

Assignment:  Both old and new students read pages 24 to 31

New students..........try placing some trees in front of your sunset.  And, try  finishing your gourds.  If you like, get wild and crazy with the remaining colors.  Experiment.

Old students........do another sunset or sunrise if you like....place a grove of trees in the foreground, or a reflecting lake.  How about some fiery clouds?