Working with Gouache

One of the older issues of Cloth Paper Scissors inspired me to work with Gouache as a medium for resist and since I had never used it before I thought I would give it a try.
It's pretty interesting in that it washes off a surface, unlike acrylic which is there forever. I guess that means if I get it on my clothes, it will come off. hmmmmm - a bonus already.
The process started with a pencil drawing, then a wash of water color and then a coat of white/or any color you wish, actually all over the piece.


After it's dry, paint white gouache over the whole thing, but do not cover up the pencil lines.
When dry, you give the entire surface a coat of black india ink. Now, that's scarey because you see all of your work disappear under this black surface of ink.



When that's dry you take your piece to the sink and wash off all the india ink to reveal your images again. Let dry and then... work your creative magic to add color, embellishments, journaling, and more.



This whole idea of this came from Lauren Grant at our Kristi Steiner Diva Retreat in February although her process was a tad different.... using white acrylic paint, but that's a story for another day.
Meg Fowler and I sat down last Saturday on that cold and rainy day and did our thing with the gouache and are results were amazing. I like this so much I think that it just might become a class that you will see on my schedule.