“As an acrylic artist I almost never used white except under other colors to  pop them.  But as a water-colorist I have reached for white a few times, and I am using an old Sakura Chinese white right now until it is all used up.  I am still not sure I will use white; I’m not  a pastel-pale kinda-gal!  I have enjoyed playing with the whites as I paint spring flowers, but doubt I will continue in this vein — it is just not me.”  That is what I wrote in my journal before I mixed the Chinese white with my colors.

But in the spirit of learning to mix colors on a palette, I decided to try out white with all my other colors.  And I can see that I might use them in my mission paintings.  I love what they do mixed with the Quinacridone Gold and Quinacridone Burnt Orange (far right bottom), and the Terre Ercolano and Venetian Red in the lower second and third places from the left.   These are the Southern California Mission colors, rich even when mixed with white!

In terms of what I discovered maxing them with similar pigments as before, I can say that the Chinese White must be a solid overpowering color when mixed, because there was little variation in the colors from the first two mixes:

• Anthraq Scarlet and Organic Vermillon, yummy

• Quinacridone Coral and Quinacridone Red (Sennelier), yummy again

• Light Yellow 578 (Sennelier) and Quinophthalo Yellow

• The only real color shift you can see is in the turquoise range, where the true colors clarify the nature paint colors — see differences in “turquoise?”

On the other hand, it made for some brilliant colors tht were not really pastels.  Okay, mind change, keeping white in my pallette!

*All watercolors Daniel Smith unless stated otherwise.

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