Rose Sweet Rose- Could it work in Watercolor?

Rose Sweet Rose
9 x9  Watercolor
by Pat Fiorello

In a post earlier this week, I shared a totally different painting approach I learned during a recent oil painting workshop. Rather than my typical more direct "alla prima" approach, this alternative approach involved a grisalle( black and white value underpainting, after drying add colors, layers as needed). I decided to do a little experiment to see if that approach of putting values down first then painting color over it would work for watercolors.  It may be a somewhat non-traditonal approach for watercolor which typically is painted from light to dark, but  after doing this experiment, I think it is a viable approach.

Here's the first stage, where I painted in just the midtones with a grey made from permanent rose, cobalt blue and indian yellow- a primary triad that is fairly transparent. Rather than mix up a big batch on one flat color, I shifted the predominance of different colors based on areas of the photos which showed warmer versus cooler passages. I also tried to be mindful of where there were soft transitions instead of hard edges and started softening the edges at this early stage knowing it is harder to do once the paint is dry.

Once that layer dried, I added the darks and let the whole painting dry overnight.









The next day I came back with color over the underpainting, resulting in the finished painting at the top of this blogpost, "Rose Sweet Rose".