Perfect Evening, St Mawes

 Kieron Williamson | Watercolour | 7 x 8 inches 

About the painting:

“I can’t remember a calmer and more beautiful evening. The early evening air was warm, and the waves lapped lazily onto Summers Beach. How quaint and Cornish do the higgled row of whitewashed cottages look and the silhouetted couple sailing their yacht under the evening sky.” Kieron

The medium:

“The choice of which medium to use on a painting is such a fundamental decision and is often the difference between success and failure. My earliest steps into painting were taken with watercolours and initial works were in a dry brush technique as I tried to gain control over this temperamental medium.

The way I now work with watercolour has changed considerably as my confidence and understanding grew. After a few years I adopted the more popular process of laying down washes, carefully leaving the white of the paper behind to suggest the brightest highlights. I worked from light to dark and the painting would be built up with just two of three washes.

More recently my process has evolved yet again. I often lay in the darkest shapes of the painting first and then glaze over the top with transparent washes, sometimes adding up to ten layers, to achieve the richness of colour.

I have always loved the medium of watercolour, simplicity is at the heart of the medium and as soon as I ‘loosened the reins’ and let the medium control me, the happier I was with the results. Sometimes the best paintings are the result of a ‘happy accident’. “ Kieron