What an exciting event occurred on April 2nd. 2022! That is for all the watercolor enthusiasts who participated in the workshop/demo given by Milind Mulick, the great artist from India. He commands the respect and love from artists from all over the world, he is the Brand ambassador of Daniel Smith watercolors and is best known for his atmospheric watercolors. That Milind Mulick gave a demo/workshop on the subject of Composition, all in the comfort of our homes! It couldn’t get better than that. Of course, nineteen artists from across the U.S participated in this event and we owe this to our Leena Joshi, under the auspices of our own MANA group.
Milind Mulick’s well known teaching method became evident as he prepared us a little by making sure that we would read excerpts from his book ahead of time. So, when he started using terms like Design and Composition and pointing out the differences in those terms, he was unraveling the various elements involved in the Composition process. How the various aspects like line, shape, color, tone and texture come into play to make up a good composition and how, within these variety, contrast, rhythm, repetition, alteration and gradation make for a great composition.
Of course, then he humorously pointed out in his light-hearted style of teaching, that all these are in the back of your mind and you just paint intuitively ultimately!
I particularly liked how his thought process took us through how he divides the rectangular spaced paper and then places the image which he points out as having simplified by our minds first and then deciding where the image shapes should be placed. He thinks in terms of ‘ shapes’ and that I think this frees the mind more.
The second thing I liked is that we should analyze our own paintings to understand these ideas.
When he did start to paint, he started with light washes of the pigments he had chosen. His explanation of the consistencies of pigments is really helpful, wherein each consistency depends upon the percentage of water that is used with the pigment. Hence, ‘tea’, coffee’, ‘milk’, ‘cream’ and ‘butter’ consistency, which is basically pigment used directly from the tube itself. And, of course, all his planning of colors was done before starting to paint……the sky a particular shade of blue, the darks in the painting in balance so that the lights played so well in the final painting.
I know all the participants thoroughly enjoyed interacting with him during the entire session, asking questions and just having a fun time. Towards the end of the session, it almost seemed that we all wanted more of this because it was such a wonderful exchange.
I understand that we will be having more such workshops with him and we all look forward to the next one, tentatively planned for May 21. I think it’s going to be on Tonal study, ( a lesson on it’s importance in a painting, understanding high and low key and balancing it correctly and more).
Once again, thank you MANA and our great appreciation for Leena Joshi who brought this opportunity to us.
