Experiments in Gouache (for Mother's Day)

Exhibit A

On Saturday I spent a very happy afternoon doing something that I've been meaning to have a crack at for quite a while now: having bought a suitably pretty card for Mother's Day (exhibit A) I decided not only to have a go at a few copperplate majascules (capitals), but also to play around with using watered down gouache as ink.

Gouache is similar to watercolour but has a higher pigment : water ratio so produces a more intense and opaque finish. I'd read about watering it down to use as ink in several places and thought it might be more fun to try  than merely going out and buying lots of different coloured inks. The one I used for the inside of Mum's card was Winsor & Newton's Designer Gouache in Brilliant Purple. This type of paint is sold in small tubes so it's easy to use as little (or as much) as you feel like - I started off with 1/2 an inch of paint squeezed into a small pot that I then watered down with drops of distilled water from a dropper. I think in the end I used about 10 drops, but you just have to keep dropping and mixing and trying it out on a bit of scrap paper until you're happy with the consistency.

I used my mixing brush to load the nib with the inky mixture and then set about getting a feel for the flow, and also making my first stab a the capitals I'd need for the card. My practice page looked a bit like this:

 As you can see, my capitals aren't amazing but the Eleanor Winters book builds them up stroke-by-stroke and you soon get the hang of how they're constructed.

From this page I made a paste-up of how I wanted the various lines positioned (I'm not yet confident enough to just 'go for it'), and marked on a second sheet the spacing so I could then go ahead and attempt a good copy.
I opted for setting it out on paper and sticking this into the card rather than writing directly on the card itself - mainly because I'm a chicken, but also partly because I wasn't sure how the surface of the card would take the gouache 'ink', and I didn't have time to get a second one if it all went horribly wrong!

I'm pleased to say that I only needed one attempt to get a good copy that I was relatively happy with. The finished thing ended up looking like this: 

 I was quite nervous when I first put pen to paper, but soon found myself enjoying the flow of ink and the sense of achievement. One thing about attempting majascules is that it makes the miniscules seem much easier! I was nearly tempted try a little flourishing as well... but I know my limitations - one step at a time, I think.



Overall, I was really pleased with how my experiments turned out. I did find that the gouache mixture tended to dry up quite quickly, especially under the heat of my desk lamp, but you can keep adding a drop of water and it dries on the paper in a beautifully uniform manner. It's a bit of a faff for everyday practising, but I'll definitely be trying some different combinations out for finished pieces.

Apart from my colourful adventures I also made cake (surprise!). This time it was Nigel Slater's Black Banana Cake. Seriously yummy and easy peasy to make - we've eaten one of them already (so it's a good job I made two!).