Nine Colour Mixing Grid

I've been sorting through some large sheets of paper and came across this chart from many years ago. I was always frustrated that a normal mixing chart only showed one or maybe two possible mixes, so I created this one to show 18 possible mixes.

The grid is 27cm x 27cm, created with 9 rows and 9 columns of 3cmx3cm squares. Each square is divided again to create 9 1cm x1cm squares. It's a fiddly to draw up and an even bigger fiddle to paint, but rather interesting. On single square can not really show the full range of possibilities - especially with interesting mixing neutrals like phthalo blue and cadmuim red, which creates Indian red hues, Prussian and indigo hues and a lovely mixed black. (I'd recommend using pyrrol scarlet rather than cadmium red as a warm red though)

It was made with a warm and a cool red, yellow and blue as well as three secondaries - orange, purple and green. 

The diagonal line of squares from top left to bottom right just show 9 variations of each of the 9 colours, which were lemon yellow, cadmium yellow deep, perinone orange, cadmium red, crimson red, imperial purple (mixed from PB29+PV19), ultramarine blue, phthalo blue and sap green. 

I'd use very different colours today - but this is just one of the many and varied charts I created to test out colour palettes. More mixing charts can be seen here, gouache mixing charts and wheels with a split primary palette here and some sample triads here.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolours

I've received a number of lovely samples of handmade watercolour paint from Arkansas USA, some of which are sold on an Etsy site Rivervale Watercolor, others are not. It is a fabulous collection of natural and synthetic pigments to be able to test, and I am very grateful to Elizabeth, along with the many others who have sent me samples over the last 5 years. They are labelled with pigment supplier and pigment numbers where known.

Available for sale (please note - this list was sent a while ago - before I broke my wrist last year - and may well have changed. I will update in the captions if necessary).

Rivervale Handmade Watercolours - Titanium White, Buff Titanium, Benzimazolone Yellow, Pyrrol Red, Quinacridone Red.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolours - Quinacridone Magenta, Ultramarine Pink, Manganese Violet, Carbazole Violet, Ultramarine Violet.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolours - Ultramarine Blue, Prussian Blue, Phthalo Blue (Green Shade), Mayan Blue, Verdigris Green Hue.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolours - Mayan Green (no longer aviable due to lightfast issues), Phthalo Green (Blue Shade), Nicosia Green Earth, Chromium Green, Verona Green Earth.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolours - Lemon Yellow Ochre, Yellow Ochre (Yellow Oxide), Raw Sienna, Italian Brown Ochre (Goethite), French Pink Clay.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolours - Luberon Burnt Sienna, Luberon Orange Ochre, Armenian Mummy Red Light, Ercolano Red, Venetian Red.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolours - Pink Pipestone (Catlinite), Armenian Crimson Ochre, Red Hematite, Potter's Pink, Augite Porphyry Violet Light Ochre.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolours - Violet Hematite, Luberon Raw Umber, Cyprus Burnt Umber, Van Dyke Brown (no longer available), General's Black Graphite.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolours - Lamp Black, Genera's Charcoal, Bone Black.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolours - Silver Mica, Gold Mica, Copper Mica, Pearl White Mica.

It is difficult to show the effects of interference colours...

Rivervale Handmade Watercolours - Phantom Rose (Interference Red), PHtantom Fire (Interference Copper), Phantom Fae Gold (Interference Gold) and Phantom Sunrise (Interference Orange)

Rivervale Handmade Watercolours - Phantom Magic (Interference Violet), Phantom Moonlight (Interference Blue), Phantom Turquoise (Interference Turquoise) Phantom Jade (Interference Green)

Not for sale
These pigments may have been too expensive, out of stock, difficult to get hold of or not of interest to make more, but they are shown here as it is so helpful to know what pigments from various suppliers actually look like when made into paint. (Any that have since been made available are noted in the captions)

I love the orange made with PO36! 

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Nite Glow, Cadmium Yellow Light, Golden Arylide (now available as Kama's Isoindolinone Yellow), Permanent Orange (now available as Benzimida Orange from Kama pigments), Cadmium Red Light.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Perylene Scarlet, Naphthol Vermilion, Cadmium Red Medium, Perylene Maroon, Perylene Crimson (now available as Perylene Carmine).

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Cadmium Red, Carmine, Carmine Nacarat, Alizarin Crimson, Quinacridone Violet (now being sold in a slightly warmver version from Kama pigments).

This is a beautiful ultramarine! The Cobalt Blue Light looks more like a phthalo blue pigment, and the Alex Artist Colors pigments tend to fade so are not recommended.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Ultramarine, Cobalt Blue Dark (not recommended), Cobalt Aluminate Blue, Cobalt Blue Light (not recommended), Indigo Genuine (NB1?).

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Cobalt Green (home made pigment), Nickol Azo Dark, Vicenza Earth, Quinacridone Gold, Red Bole.

I may be a little biased, but I love the Australian Reef Clay. Like Piemontite from DS it has fabulous granulation.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Terre Pozzouli, Italian Burnt Sienna, Pink Ochre, Rosewood, Australian Reef Clay.

These rich earthy reds are gorgeous. I am guessing the two on the right would be made with PR101.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Quinacridone Russet, Red Hot HFT, Red Oxide, Red Ochre Dark, Wineberry Ochre

These are so rich!

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Mars Violet, Caput Mortuum, Red Oxide Blue Shade, Cote d'Azur Violet, Nicosia Burnt Umber CC (now being sold as Burnt Umber Cold).

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Green Umber, Natural Silver Graphite, Vine Black.

Here are some more lovely samples of handmade paint from our earth.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Cinnabar Fine, Dragons Blood (disolved from the sap with alcohol), Côte d'Azur Violet, Thulite, Lazurite (from Baikal)

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Viviantie Blue Fine, Viviantie, Viviantie, Vivianite.

It was a real treat to paint out a genuine Lapis Lazuli sample!

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Lazurite First Class (Lapis Lazuli), Azurite Optima, Azurite, Azurite BIS, Turquoise Sky Blue.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples  - Dioptase, Malachite Fine, Malachite, Celadonite, Celatonite.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Clauconite, Chrysocolla, Mountain Green (Buckthorn Green - a lovely but fugitive colour), Chrysocolla, Volkonskoite.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Arkansas Olive Green Tuff, Arkansas Yellow Jasper, Jarosite Light, Cyprus Jarosite, Yellow Jasper IWA-OUDO #14,

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Tiger Eye, Arkansas Red Jasper, Red Jasper, Caput Mortuum, Indian Red.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Hematite Cold, Hematite, Mummy Violet, Caput Mortuum, Tuff Purple.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Shungite.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Silver Foil, Crucible Gold, Forged Gold, Crucible Red.

Elizabeth has also created beautiful samples of some rather nasty pigments. It is fabulous to see these historic tough dangerous (and/or fugitive) colours in the flesh! Vermilion is a mercury sulfide. Mimium (Red Lead) is created by heating white lead. It would turn yellow then orange. Realgar is a natural mineral of arsenic sulfide, closely related to Orpiment

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Vermilion, Minium (Red Lead), Realgar.

Lead Tin Yellow is a highly poisonous lead stannate - and oxide of lead and tin. Gamboge comes from the sap of the Garcinia tree and is a diuretic - it is also fugitive. Orpiment is yellow arsenic sulfide.

Rivervale Handmade Watercolour Samples - Lead Tin Yellow Pale, Gamboge, Orpiment.

We are very lucky that these poisonous pigments have been replaced with safer alternatives!

Happy painting :-)

ARTescape 2018

I'm excited to have been invited to teach at the Cairns ARTescape for 2018 - a week long workshop series in beautiful North Queensland, Australia. We'll be based in the Botanic Gardens Arts Precinct - what could be more perfect?

I'll be teaching a 5 day Watercolour Bootcamp - a great workshop for those relatively new to watercolour, or even more experienced artists, who want to really get to know and understand how this fabulous medium works. We'll set up the perfect palette for each student, explore the many characteristics watercolours, create useful mixing charts and colour wheels and paint a number of studies and more detailed paintings exploring a range of techniques and some interesting triads.

You can see the full program here

ARTescape Brochure 2018 3.pdf

To register click here

https://reg.eventgate.com.au/Event/11496/Cairns-ARTescape-2018-

Snow Gum. Watercolour.