Advancing with Watercolor: Immersion - Making it Rain

Imagination

Last week I mentioned a term “Visioneering” coined by Robert Wade , one of the great Modern water colorists. However, he calls it "Visioneering".   I love that term.  He says, "One of the most important aspects of my way of working is how I apply my process of Visioneering.  I'm never satisfied with representing a subject just how it is.  I want to give my own interpretation of what’s there and my reaction to it.  In other words, I don't want to paint how it looks, I want to paint how it FEELS."

Some scenes will elicit a feeling and I find that the more painting I do the more often I am able to tap into this feeling. I think this exercise holds a lot of value for the artist - to go beyond what the eyes tell us and to fashion our own vision is at the essence of fine art.

We delved into color as a means of reaching a deeper expression last week and started down the path of “visioneering” lets continue to build on this exercise and discover a vocabulary for communicating the way feeling that surfaces when we look at our scene. One of the things I enjoy - on any occasion - is a rainy day - Falling rain makes it difficult to stand outside and paint but I find that I can bring a few things into a dry scene and recreate the feeling of a rainy day.