Watercolour Paintings

The last few pieces of art I've worked on have been in watercolour. It's strange, I seem to go for ages avoiding watercolour only to get addicted to it when I do get back on it. I must admit sometimes I don't feel I have the patience to use it. With acrylics my typical way of working is 'throw it all on and then refine' (basically my initial bottom layer looks like some crazy form of modern art perhaps...) With watercolour you simply can't do that. It's rather less forgiving. I've had times in the past where I've dropped a paint brush loaded with paint only to splatter it all over the lightest area. It's annoying in any medium but at least with acrylic you stand a good chance of painting over it!

But anyway, at times I really want to work in watercolour!

And onto the art:

Hooded rat pea fishing (based on a photograph I took of Jasper). It's A4 in size.

Gerbera plant. I couldn't resist buying this plant because of it's unusual colouring. I painted it over a course of days from life (desperate to finish it in case the flowers developed more!) Also A4 in size.

And this blog wouldn't be the same without a rat image! This is possibly the strangest capture I've had. I didn't even realise what was going on until I looked back at the photos once they were on my computer. Felix taking a bite out of baby Jake (not really, no rats were hurt as there was definitely no argument that day when they were freeranging). Perhaps it was just his face happened to be there, or he was going to groom Jake, who knows? As for my new rats Jake and Domino, Jake is far more social as he was when I first got him. It's strange really as they've both had the same upbringing etc. Jake will 'groom' my hand if I put it in the cage (he even went as far as licking my arm too!) It's a sign of affection in rats and I find it very cute even though others might not!

And on an unrelated note, I'm very into dreams and what they mean. However the last few days I've had quite random dreams involving the killer whale from the film 'Free Willy' (like starring in a film with him, and taking part in a video game based on the film?!). If anything, you'd think I'd dream of rats ;p

- The Blogging Rat