Learning more about Paint

Doing a course with Jill at Look and Draw this week.  It's all about making paint.  It seems you can make paint from almost anything - i.e. pigment plus water, pigment plus glue, pigment plus egg, and so on. I'm finding it very interesting. Lots to make use of in future.

Yesterday we made traditional rabbit skin size and gesso and then used these in a not-so-traditional way.  After sizing the working surface (both sides), we then applied some collage using the gesso.  The gesso acted as a glue and could also be painted over the collage. Then we could draw on top of it and scratch into it. For instance...

This image is based on a sketch I did of a fishing hut in Applecross. There is some collage in this, some sand glued on, and then I have drawn into it with graphite and scratched into it with a blade. I haven't taken this any further yet. I did another board.

This is another image based on Applecross huts - I used collage and charcoal.  I found it similar to drawing into white acrylic and PVA, but the rabbitskin gesso had more transparency. I did like the whiteness and dreaminess, but I decided to use this board for further work.  We made paint by moistening pigment and then adding the size.  This gave very vibrant colours - prussian blue, red ochre, and two yellows.  I worked with these colours and gesso, painting with more of the transparent size, thinking about the greys of the wood and the oranges of the corrugated iron etc. It ended up like this.

I got very excited about using these materials - hope to use them again.
In the meantime, today we used the pigment to make inks, water colours, eggy paints and gouache. And tomorrow it's egg tempura. Then onto beeswax and oil paints! Phew!  (I'm making lots of notes).