Are you ready for this?

6" x 8" Mixed media on paper mounted on canvas

Okay, I may have made a mistake... or maybe not. The above image is the final piece with a bit of work added... some dry pastels, more gouache, ummm, black india ink pen.

Ink washed off

Here is the painting with the ink washed off and no additional work. It seems to me the whole piece got a little dull on me, so I thought I would try again!

Red Cup before ink

Here is a quick study of just the cup, but I used solid red for the cup. I laid the gouache on really, really heavy this time and hopefully I let it dry enough before I poured on some india ink.

Red Cup with india ink

Okay, not a great photo again, but I do hope you get the idea. Rather than brushing the ink on, I poured it on then kind of allowed it to flow around by tipping the paper different directions. I also left some areas free of ink. Control areas I guess they would be in the experimental (scientific) world. In the first picture, the white line that indicates the horizon or table top has no paint on it. It is the white of the gessoed paper. I wanted to see if the ink would make a black line out of the un-gouached places.

Okay, tomorrow I will wash the gouache! 

Two experiments here: 1. Will laying down the gouache thicker allow the painting to come out brighter, and 2. Will the un-gouached areas become ink black?

Tomorrow....

-jM