It all begins with an idea.

As part of my ongoing in-depth study of color, I’m reading about color trying to learn more about color theory as well as working physically with pigments and color mixing.

I worked on Cobalt Blue, Cerulean Blue and French Ultramarine color mixing swatch sets.

First swatch sheet that includes all 12 pigments in their pure form plus tinted versions of each.

I’ve been working on my color swatch project for seven weeks now! The idea behind the project is to help me establish a solid foundation of color knowledge and to teach me how to mix colors well.

This piece was super challenging—much more than expected. When I first chose to paint water, I thought a small canvas would be good to start with as a practice piece.

Initial research on color swatches led me to a great article written on this exact subject! How I Learned About Color Mixing, by Julia Lundman — a great primer in color mixing. She led me to Richard Schmid’s book, Alla Prima.

For this painting my color palette included French Ultramarine, Cobalt Blue, Permanent Rose, Alizarin Crimson, Cadmium Red, Cadmium Lemon, Yellow Deep, Yellow Ochre Pale, Viridian and Titanium White.