To me I’m in Turner’s court when he quoted (1) “come here – come here! Look at this thunderstorm! Isn’t it grand? – Isn’t it wonderful? – Isn’t it sublime?. .There, Hawkey; in two years you will see this again, and call it ‘Hannibal Crossing the Alps‘.”
There is something sublime about the sky and I think it is the fact that it is so grand and powerful it leave us humans feeling so insignificant. Just like the chasm of a mountain or the raging sea the only thing we can do to capture it is to…..portray it.
The skies and clouds can be an endless source of variety, colour and inspiration, whatever the weather, so I looked at a few mediums that I thought would express them the best.
Looking into the different types of clouds it was interesting to notice that even though each cloud is everchanging and never the same, each ‘specie’ of cloud holds there individual character or essence. You can tell a cumulus from a cirrostratus just as you can tell asilver birch from an oak tree. However neither tree is identical. With this in mind I started mapping out the clouds as I did with the trees. Breaking them down into geometric triangles and squares, smaller ovals and circles, it was easier to make a bit more sense of the structure of the cloud. From there it was just a matter of observing where the light was coming from and adding the shadow.
When using graphite and charcoal I would then blend the areas in and another dark layer, repeat, then start to bring out the detail with the eraser, blend and repeat. This process could go on indefinitely until the desired clarity and sharpness is achieved.
The same starting process was preformed with the water colour clouds but the techniques of adding and erasing with a brush were a little diferent.
I was able to utilise wet on wet, wet on dry, dry on dry, rubbing, smudging and scraping, all with dramatically different effects and enjoyed exploring the possibilities.
playing with water colour and mixed media 
playing with water colour and mixed media
I also played around with adding detail over the water colour with w/colour pencil to get an even sharper line, similar to the effect with the eraser which opened up more possibilities. The addition of colour also added an extra dimension to the use of water colour.
Review.
I could see the potential with water colour, but I think it will take me some time to fully grasp the techniques needed to produce a convincing sky. I am tempted to keep this medium up with other projects with some practice. I feel the whole idea of watercolour is a fast, fluid, confident flow (hence the water), which will only come with practice and becoming familiar with the medium. After that…the sky’s the limit!
References.
(1) Quote c. 1810; “come here – come here!….and call it ‘Hannibal Crossing the Alps‘.” quoted in ‘A brief history of weather in European landscape art’, John E. Thornes, in Weather Volume 55, Issue 10 Oct. 2000, p. 368
Eeyanski Arts 