Core Skills: Part 1 - Warming Up To Watercolour

Come on in, the water’s fine! Join artist and teacher KELLY MCKERNAN in discovering how to work with, not against, this wonderfully surprising medium

- Kelly McKernan

When someone finds out that I work in watercolour, their immediate response is often “But watercolour is so hard!” An unsurprising reaction, perhaps…

I discovered watercolour as a teenager, and instead of being intimidated by its unpredictable nature, I saw endless possibilities. I gradually realised that watercolour offers a unique, collaborative relationship with the artist – one that isn’t so straightforward and requires experimentation, openness and most importantly, patience.

By its very nature, watercolour appears to be a difficult beast to tame. After all, its primary vehicle is water! It’s key to bear in mind that there’ll always be an element of surprise when working with watercolour. Over time and with lots of experimentation and implementation of tried-and-true techniques, I’ve learned first to control what I can, and as for the rest, work intuitively and allow watercolour to be watercolour. At times it will take the wheel whether you like it or not, but you’ll live for those moments when it pleasantly surprises you!

As well as having an open mind and endless patience, working with watercolour requires a particular setup, proper materials, a little technique and a lot of experimentation. In this series, I’m going to share with you how I work with this incredibly versatile and exciting medium and make the best of watercolour’s delightfully protean nature.