DVD Watercolour Plein Air || Andy Evansen

There’s so much to like in this engaging and informative film that it’s hard to know where to start.

Let’s begin with an introduction: Andy Evansen is an American artist who paints in the classic English watercolour style, with muted colours and plenty of wet-in-wet. Although that mostly demands larger brushes, his is not the broad-shapes, evolving-composition method, but rather the more holistic approach we’re used to, where the starting point is a general outline that builds on overall composition and colour. He frequently starts with a value sketch which is used establish both the shape of the final work and the way the elements of the picture relate to each other. One of his particularly interesting tropes is unification of shape, where the main elements of the picture effectively merge into each other, creating the line that leads the viewer through the painting.

He is also interesting on the role of the viewer, talking at one point about “the illusion of detail”, where a few clues – in figures and animals, for instance – prompt the eye to fill in the rest of the structure. Overall, too, his way of working is to suggest rather than tell and he is very good on ways of simplifying complex shapes.

This is a film about painting on location and Andy explains why this is important. He shows how colours and composition can be adjusted to reflect the developing scene, how the value sketch can be used as a record when lighting changes and why a photograph can’t capture the subtleties of colour and hues. He also has a trick of leaving the work about 90% complete so that the final touches can be added in the calm of the studio. A quick closing section shows how subtle these can be – small marks that highlight form and structure or clarify some of the smaller details. This is not about fiddling, just tidying up when the overall vision is clearer.

Theses reviews are often peppered with quotes, but Andy isn’t that sort of demonstrator. There aren’t forehead-slapping, “Oh gosh” moments, but rather a growing sense of being informed and of watching what I can really only call the magic taking place before your eyes. It’s hugely entertaining, but strongly and subtly instructive as well. I hope we can see more of Andy.

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