“Playing in the Sun”
The painting above was a watercolor breakthrough.

Here I was looking at a typical failure. Frustrated, I reached to put the painting into the trash can. Then I recalled an article about putting a painting under water for a few minutes to allow the pigments to soften... then, scraping off those sections you were unhappy with using a bristle brush. This was to be done while the painting was still under water. This was a perfect time to give it a try.

I waited about three minutes and began stroking those areas that were total failures using a small bristle brush. What I experienced was amazing. The areas I stroked with the brush were coming off. Everything else remained intact.

When I had removed the selected areas, I lifted the painting from the water, placed it on a toweled board and while it was still wet I began to add new pigments in the areas where I wanted to start over. I had to use the pigment almost directly out of the tube because the water diluted it so quickly. I worked as quickly as possible before the water in the paper began to dry out.

After I had what I thought was a satisfactory solution I stopped to enjoy what was a whole new way to paint for me. Off to bed I went thinking it would probably be so diluted when I returned that everything would be gone. But, not so. The next morning... there it was, just as bright and beautiful as it was the night before. A new technique was born.