I love painting with watercolors. I’ve always preferred watercolor over acrylic and oils. If I had to choose a second favorite, it would probably be oils, but watercolor will always be #1 in my book.
Watercolors are freeing, easy to clean up and travel with, and can produce unique, unexpected results. These are just a few reasons why I love them so much.
Lately, my favorite things to paint are abstract landscapes; doing so makes me happy. So I keep on creating them.
In this post, I wanted to share a few landscapes I’ve made recently along with a few extra thoughts about creating these abstract paintings. 🙂
Painting Abstract Watercolor Landscapes
I never have much of a plan when creating my abstract watercolor landscapes. I’ll just sit down, know I want to make a landscape, and then start putting paint on my watercolor paper.
Many call this way of painting intuitive painting. This simply means you sit down and start painting with no sketch or idea in mind. So my watercolor landscapes are all created by “intuitive painting.” And honestly, I feel like I do my best work like this! I often get stressed when I try to sketch out my ideas and plan ahead because I don’t want to mess up.
Related: How To Add White Details To Watercolor Paintings
With these paintings, I’ll start with the sky first and work my way down. The horizon line is my favorite part because that’s where I typically build up a lot of color. It’s so much fun!
The magic of these paintings comes from the process. What will the end result be? I have no idea! Will it be a lake, a field, or a marsh? Who knows. Once the paint starts to dance on the paper I get an idea of where it will go. Sometimes it will go completely unexpected and turn into something completely different.
I let the paint show me where the painting should go. It’s so freeing and relaxing.
Once landscape features appear then I’ll understand what the painting should be. I typically only use a few colors in these paintings, but once again it all depends on what happens and where it goes.
Often these landscapes turn into mixed-media pieces. Sometimes I’ll use some soft pastels to add interesting marks, and I love to use a white gel pen for highlights.
In my abstract watercolor landscapes, I like to use salt to create unique textures. I’ll typically use salt in the sky or in the foreground for interest.
It seems I can’t paint a watercolor painting without using salt in some area of the painting, I’m just addicted to the results it produces. I share more about the salt & watercolor process in this post below.
You know you’re creating what you’re supposed to be creating when it makes you happy and excited. This post just shares a few of my recent paintings but honestly, I have a stack on my desk. They are easy to whip out when you have no plan.
I’m looking forward to seeing how I grow with these landscapes. Every time I play I grow more confident. Strangely, creating abstract landscapes can sometimes be intimidating, which seems silly. But I’m learning to just play and not worry about how it’ll end up.
Intuitive painting has helped me relax a little bit because I have no idea where the painting will go so I’m not stressing over the final result as much as I would with a planned-out art piece. I plan on writing more posts on intuitive painting soon!
Do you like to create abstract watercolor landscapes? What is your process? I’d love to hear.
Thanks for reading!
-Amanda
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