Photos from the Birds in Watercolour Workshop

     

We had such a great experience exploring all the secrets of watercolour painting last weekend. Huge thanks to the Queensland Wildlife Artists Society for organising the workshop and to all the fifteen artists who were very dedicated and keen to paint birds. Most photos here are from the attendees.

Personally, I had heaps of fun, it was a great pleasure and honour to share my skills with others. 

I hope we'll do it again soon!

For now, I offer private, one to one tuition on weekends on drawing and watercolour painting on any natural subject, birds in particular in Brisbane.

Send me an email if you are interested at matteogrilliart@gmail.com

My few and very trusted tools and my own work in progress for one of our subjects, the Crested Pigeon, which allowed us to explore the practice of choosing and mixing colours, building up layers of washes, blending, iridescence and fine detail.

Double-barred Finches - Indian Yellow - The Holmes Art Prize for Realistic Australian Bird Art

August Dry (Double-barred Finches) Handmade watercolour on Khadi handmade watercolour paper, 30 x 42cm, © Matteo Grilli

I was visiting a popular birding spot in Brisbane, Oxley Creek Common, on a very dry August day, a small flock of Double-barred Finches was busy finding food on the path and on the dry grasses nearby.

Indian Yellow makes a wonderful primary yellow, it leans towards orange in thick applications while it becomes a lemony yellow in light tints and washes. The Indian Yellow I make mixes beautifully with Prussian Blue for very natural greens or with Madder Red Deep for muted oranges, and Carmine for bright oranges and reds. It is staining and only lifts to a degree. Find it on Etsy.

One of my watercolours (Summer's End - Chestnut-breasted Mannikins) was selected as a finalist together with 34 more artists for the Holmes Art Prize for Realistic Australian Bird Art 2019, all the amazing artworks will be exposed at Mary Cairncross Reserve, Maleny until October 13.

Making Terra Pozzuoli

Terra Pozzuoli is a natural red-earth colour, although originally from southern Italy, it can be found in  many other locations around the world, to me it would be the perfect colour to paint the Australian desert and similar landscapes. It is a very strong colour with a big personality, while mixing, a little will go a very long way, overpowering all other colours, it is in fact, the strongest of my palette. Used in small amounts with other colours can create the most beautiful, natural and harmonious mixes ideal to paint anything nature-related, from landscapes to architecture, wildlife and portraits.

Handmade Terra Pozzuoli watercolour paint on Etsy

Summer's End - Chestnut-breasted Mannikins and Handmade Watercolours Video

Summer's End, handmade watercolours on Fabriano watercolour paper, 45 x 38 cm, 

© Matteo Grilli.

I painted most of this watercolour while demonstrating at the Logan Art Gallery during my last exhibition. A the end of summer, Chestnut-breasted Mannikins gather in large groups including all the young birds. I saw this family of five at Sandy Camp Road park on the eastern Brisbane suburb of Wynnum North.

This video shows how I make my handmade watercolour paints, I hope you enjoy:

Welcome Swallow

Welcome Swallow, handmade watercolour, white gouache on Khadi handmade watercolour paper, 

25 x 24 cm, © Matteo Grilli.

This watercolour only required three colours, Prussian Blue, Madder Red Deep and Burnt Sienna and white gouache for some highlights.

Orange Bushbrown Butterfly

Orange Bushbrown, Mycalesis terminus, handmade watercolours on Fabriano paper, 15 x 18 cm, © Matteo Grilli

This small painting came after my visit to tropical north Queensland, a birding trip, although all other wildlife was just as interesting.

Australasian Grebe

Australasian Grebe, handmade watercolours on Fabriano paper, 19 x 29 cm, © Matteo Grilli

Red-necked Wallabies Watercolour

Red-necked Wallabies Macropus rufogriseus, handmade watercolours on Fabriano coloured paper, 22 x 24 cm, © Matteo Grilli

This watercolour painting is also available as a greeting card.

Detail

Work in progress

Glimpse of Sea-life

Glimpse of Sea-life, handmade watercolours on Fabriano watercolour paper, 26 x 35 cm, 

© Matteo Grilli.

For this still-life of Australian shells and beach findings I drew inspiration form an old sketchbook dating back to my time in the Galway Bay, Ireland, see the top right-hand-side corner of the photo above.

It is amazing to find such a variety of creatures in just a handful of items. Using a nature guide book I could identify the remains of the following creatures:

Spengler's Triton
Hercules Club
Pipi
Tellens
Mactras (Truncate; Reddish and Dissimilar)
Cockles
Scallops
Reef Crab's chelae
Bell Acorn Barnacle
Brain Coral

This artwork is available as a greeting card. For this artwork I have used a selection of four of my own handmade watercolour paints. Talking about handmade paints, I just published a page on my blog which explains with photos the fascinating process of watercolour making, take a look HERE, I hope you will like it.

Thank you for reading.

All the best,

Matteo

Saltwater Crocodile

Saltwater Crocodile - Crocodylus porosus, handmade ink, handmade watercolour, white gouache on toned paper, 23 x 37 cm, © Matteo Grilli 2015

For this watercolour of a Saltwater Crocodile I used a different technique which was great fun. I laid a light wash of Burnt Umber to give an off-white tone to the paper, then I sketched a light pencil drawing of the Crocodile. Then, I decided to draw a more detailed sketch using Chinese black ink obtained from a traditional ink stick ground with some water on an ink stone (see materials on the top right hand corner of the image), the ink was then loaded on to the dipping pen's nib with a brush.

After I finished with the ink drawing, I started applying washes and glazes of watercolour.

At last I used some white gouache to highlight the colour of the teeth.