Bring
the outdoors indoors and brighten up even the grayest day
by painting the natural world. Ms. Mason’s style is
almost photographic in its detail, capturing the beauty and
color of flora and fauna through the medium of watercolor.
This lushly illustrated hardcover book gives in insight into
how she works, and how to use her expertise to capture nature
for yourself.
Ms. Mason runs an online painting school, and reading this
book is a bit like attending a class. This is due to her way
of talking to the reader, describing how she goes about her
work and imparting all kinds of useful tips. She starts by
talking about her love of gardening and nature, and how soul
refreshing it is. There are tips for using a camera, working
from photographs and composing a good picture. All her lessons
are accompanied by many examples so it is easy to understand
what is being discussed. Discover this artist’s own
take on choosing materials, achieving realism, drawing and
painting techniques and more. It is very much a personal look
at her methods in one way, but they are methods that would
work well for anybody trying to achieve a similar realistic
look to their art. Half the book is given to learning the
basics of this style of painting and the other to the projects.
There are only four of these but each one really goes into
everything you need to know to produce the picture. You can
work through all the stages, each of which has a photograph
of the picture at that stage plus a description of what to
do. Paint a blackberry, autumn leaf, sunflower head and a
blue tit; the realistic style not only brings them to vibrant
life but enables the painter to see their detail and beauty.
At the back are traceable outlines which help those whose
drawing skills are not of the best, but I would mostly recommend
this book to somebody with a good working knowledge of painting.
This is a gorgeously illustrated book with plenty of coffee
table appeal while being a user friendly primer at the same
time. Highly recommended.
If you cannot find a good range of watercolor materials locally
try www.searchpress.com for a list of suppliers.
Reviews
of other titles by this author
The
Modern Flower Painter
Anna
Mason’s Watercolour World
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