Northern Lights Watercolour Paintings

Right before our winter break, I had a guest artist come and do a mini workshop with one of my junior high art classes. Inna Nagaytseva is a self-taught watercolor artist from the Ukraine who moved to Canada a couple of years ago. She runs an art studio in Calgary, Alberta where she offers classes and workshops. See her work on her Instagram page: @innanagaytseva

She brought supplies with her as she only uses cotton watercolour paper and I don't use that. She also brought pieces of black corrugated plastic for the kids to work on top of. I've never seen these used before so it was interesting to see.

Cotton watercolour paper, for those not familiar, is best for really wet-on-wet techniques, which Inna teaches. When it comes to texture, cotton paper is typically smoother than cellulose. That's why when you apply watercolors to it, you don't have to do a lot of blending. The colors move themselves and mix with ease. The only downside is that if you want to add texture to your painting, it will require extra effort.

Students started by painting both sides of their paper with water. Then they used their laptops to find a reference photo of northern lights to refer to. They used vertical strokes in the sky. 

I think my students did a great job and they enjoyed learning from a professional artist!