The Paintbox got Updated

Equipment, Tools, Uncategorised, Watercolour

Having used my original SW-designed-and-built-revolutionary-hold-many-paint-pans-as-you-could-wish-for watercolour box for a few months, it has evolved.
It needed to be smaller, so it could fit into my many bags, I have a need to wander this earth with the means to paint always at hand.  I think its like having a security blanket, I always feel OK if I have some painting gear with me, not just a tube of paint or a brush, not even a pencil and sketchbook but almost a complete studio…in miniature!  “its OK BBC News, I can explain what happened…look I painted it!”
Anyway, to put it another way, I have improved the box that I made in March.

So now I present:  The All Singing, All Dancing Painting Box for Watercolour, open it up and you find…

Housed in a small cigar box, 21 cm x 16 cm or 8.25 x 6.25 inches, lives this…
  • A ceramic pallett – not stuck in but wedged in to make removal and cleaning easy.  Its ceramic because I am trying to cut down on the amount of plastic that I use and I am a bit in love with old fashioned style art materials.
  • A section for brushes to stand in waiting – a habit that I picked up while working in Poland in the film Loving Vincent, having the brushes that I used at hand is, well, very handy!
  • A linen lined section to hold my brushes – secure and safe and lovingly wrapped, brushes are so important and, especially with watercolour brushes, so delicate.  I have a lot of brushes but about six firm favorites that I always use…so this is their place.
  • Little wooden lids – these are to protect the paints from getting paint on each other while in transit.  There is no reason for the little wooden lids being cut up (not very neatly I will add) other that I was making this with what materials I had on hand in the studio…it is a prototype you know!
  • Snuggly brushes revealed as well as the gouache section (sounds like a bit of an orchestra) I like to have a little gouache on hand, mainly white, zink and permanent as well as a lemon yellow. Very useful.

And here it is, open and ready for action.
I do have larger boxes full of watercolour paint, I will do another post about them later, this sort of set up however is what I have with me at all times, it comes on my travels and I use it to paint my sketchbooks that end up in opening frames…one of which has been selected for The Sunday Times Watercolour Competition this year.  Which is very exciting indeed.

I have also designed a plein air oil painting box, I couldn’t find one that worked for me so I designed what I wanted and have got a genius woodworking friend to make it up, if it works I will be showing it here…very soon.

Sarah

About Sarah

Sarah Wimperis is a professional artist and illustrator and also works for Artlook in Client Support and as our Artist Ambassador. Sarah's Artlook website is here.