Experimenting with painting flow

This week, my goal was to test a method to stretch watercolour paper so that it does not bend and buckle during heavy washes. Also, on this occasion, I kept working on a new composition, being inspired by a panoramic scene of Florence that I saw during my vacation there last Summer.

To prepare the Arches sheet for work, I kept it fully immersed in water for 5 minutes, then spread it over a flat acrylic surface. To keep the paper from shrinking as it dries overnight, I used regular tape with a polymer glue that does not activate when wet along the border, reinforcing the grip with wooden strips mounted on top with clamps.

The following day, when the paper became dry, I transferred over it my preliminary sketch

My choice of paints for this exercise was Ultramarin Blue, Raw Sienna, and Burned Sienna from Daniel Smith.

The result above warrants significant self-criticism. My attempt to paint the sky with a flat wash using a medium-sized mop brush turned out to be unfortunate because the pencil markings (2B) were too strong, and I could not control the pigment to flow along them perfectly, nor did I have time to soften the borders. The huge mistake was to start with a medium tone at the top, and also to mimic the gradation that towers above the horizon line.

After the painting was dry, I removed the tape to release it from the support. It is bent, meaning that the technique is not proper.

Now, recalling the preliminary steps, I think the polymer tape was a very poor choice for the purpose. I watched a few videos on YouTube posted about stretching the watercolour paper. I noticed that most artists use gummed kraft tape that activates with water for this purpose, with excellent results.

I have just placed an order to Amazon for such a tape hoping to repeat the experiment again next week.