Drawing is one of the most favorite kinds of children's creativity. Children pick up the brush very early, in 1-2 years, and with pleasure transfer their imagination to paper. Becoming older, they are already drawing something concrete, striving for maximum resemblance to the original.
Usually the first paint with which the baby gets acquainted is watercolor or gouache. They are different in their properties, and before you begin teaching your child to paint, parents should familiarize themselves with the peculiarities of these colors. For example, watercolors differ from others in their transparency and ease, which they attach to artwork. That is why drawing watercolor is usually much more difficult: all the defects immediately become visible in the picture.
How to choose a watercolor?
To buy high-quality paints, pay attention to the following points.
- Watercolor can be dry, in cuvettes and in tubes. Choose a paint taking into account the age and skills of the child. For example, paint in tubes is easier to mix, but in an inexperienced artist its consumption is too great. For preschoolers, dyes in cuvettes are convenient, but be sure to teach the child to wash the brush before each set of a new color.
- A standard "school" set of watercolors is suitable for drawing on an amateur level. If your child sets a goal to seriously study the fine arts, buy him professional paints. Their quality is much higher, and they will not beat the child to hunt for art because of the picture, spoiled by "floated" or too dull paint.
- Do not think that the more shades of watercolor in the set, the better. In fact, a maximum of ten colors are used, which, when mixed together, give numerous shades, and the presence of additional colors on the palette that are rarely used is simply inconvenient.
Also do not forget about watercolor brushes: they should be soft (ponies, squirrel) and good quality. Take brushes in different sizes: large ones will be useful for covering large areas of paint, for example, for drawing a background, medium-sized brushes for the main job, and the thinnest and sharpest ones for drawing small details.
Paper also plays an important role in drawing. If you want the drawings to turn out to be alive and bright, and the sheet does not crumple, use special paper for watercolor. It is more dense than usual album sheets, has a specific relief and absorbs moisture well. Paper for watercolor can be both white and color.
How to paint beautifully and correctly with watercolor?
To learn how to draw, you need to learn in practice different techniques of watercolor painting. Here are the main points of learning that you should know about.
1. Initially, the paper for watercolor should be moistened and tightened, attaching the buttons to the tablet so that it does not warp during the drawing.
2. How to build watercolor? Mix a small amount of paint with water on the palette. If the color is more intense than necessary, add a little water until the desired transparency is achieved. Keep in mind that after drying, watercolor noticeably brightens.
3. How to mix watercolor? To do this, you need to know the basics of color letters: the three primary colors form three additional colors, which in turn also blend into shades. Explain to the child that if he mixes the red paint with the blue, he will get a purple color, etc.
4. What are the techniques of watercolor?
- washing (homogeneous coating of paper, with which the background is made-sky, grass, road, water surface, etc.);
- stretching (from the most intense, bright color, to white);
- The "dry" technique assumes the drying of each previous layer before applying the next one;
- "wet" technique is that the paint is applied to the
a previously moistened sheet of paper, giving soft and bizarre color transitions.
5. How to erase watercolor from paper? This is easy to do until the paint has dried up: wring out the brush so that it is almost dry, and dabbing it into the stain of paint that needs to be erased, gradually "dump" it. To wipe the dried up watercolor is much more difficult, and it should be done with a slightly damp brush. Be careful not to damage the paper. Working with watercolor implies a minimum of errors precisely because it is difficult to erase incorrect strokes. In addition, remember that there is no white watercolor, so those places in the picture that should remain white should not be painted in the beginning.