Watercolour Textures: An art guide from basic textures to advanced compositions (Collins Artist’s Studio)

If you are familiar with Ann Blockley's flower paintings, you will be surprised by this book. (You can see a gallery of Blockley's paintings on her website.) It is no ordinary, watercolour how-to book, and the cover and title give nothing away. In this book, the author admits that she has stepped well outside her comfort zone to explore an entirely new approach to the painting process. We can be very glad that she did.The simple chapter headings give no idea of the innovations Blockley presents. There are the usual texture mediums described in other art instruction books, but Blockely applies these mediums in entirely new ways: clingfilm, salt, inks, granulation medium, bubbles and foam, gold and silver pigments, paint resist and more. The beautiful colour illustrations inspire and encourage the reader to experiment, but the text is even more important.You could approach this book in one of two ways: either you can use it for the techniques alone, or you can use the techniques to move outside your artistic comfort zone as Blockley has done - beyond what is familiar in your established approach to painting. Blockley admits that it took courage to do this publicly in a book. Any artist - of any medium - can take heart - and inspiration - from what the author shares of her out-of-the-zone process.This book has plenty of demonstrations and includes three guest artists: Shirley Trevena, Moira Huntly and John Blockley, all of whom explored art mediums in daring ways. You can google all three names and take a look at their on-line galleries.I nearly didn't buy this book because watercolour is not my medium. I am so glad I did. It's one of the best books I've come across for encouraging the exploration of new ways of artistic expression - in any medium. Better still, Blockley makes the process simple, interesting and fun.

Love the content of this book. Unfortunately the delivery guy sat something heavy on it and warped the cover!

Good info with beautiful paintings. Well written, just doesn't have enough demonstrations.

I recently purchased , Experimental flowers, landscapes, watercolor texture and watercolor workshop. All books are good. this book may have more appeal it presents various subjects and how to develop them in various fashions . The Watercolor texture book is very informative , The experimental books are very good however more from a contemplative point of view. I have written this same review for all 4 books.

I'm a beginner in watercolor and I really enjoy this book. It gives great ideas for different textures in your painting and the book is also beautifully illustrated. She talks about the different kinds of watercolors you can use, like the ones from a tube or the ones from a palette. She also talks about the different kinds of paper you can use and how that affects your painting. She shows you different techniques throughout the book, like if you're interesting in painting abstract or more realistic paintings, she shows you how.My watercolors don't look like the ones in the book yet, but I'm getting there.

A beautiful watercolour instruction book for the more advanced painter. A lot of ideas for taking your paintings in a different direction using various other media along with watercolour. Not a detailed instruction book so not good for the beginning painter. Unlike many other books, there are no repetitious chapters on materials and colour selections.

Inspiring, beautiful and resonant. This work would not be helpful for an absolute beginner, but it has helped me add the texture, dimension and freedom to my painting that I so admire in the works of others, like Ann Blockley. Among the most interesting discoveries this book led me to? Texture medium.

The book is loaded with eye candy but no "recipes ". There are tantalizing and amazing pictures of unique techniques as well as the usual techniques. While there is some mention of materials, there is very little explanation of HOW the results in the pictures were obtained (except for the usual techniques like masking, wax resist, plastic wrap, etc which were explained in detail). I am not new to watercolor, but even learning how to obtain results like shown on the cover are still a mystery, as methods were barely touched on. Lots of glowing text about the beauty of the painting examples needs to be replaced with more step by step pictures to explain methods, especially those techniques that are uncommon. The book doesnt cover enough "how to", just materials are sometimes eluded to.