Wet-into-Wet Watercolor Painting Technique

Wet-into-Wet Watercolor Painting Technique

Article by Vladimir London, Watercolor Academy tutor

The wet-into-wet watercolor painting method is great for depicting atmospheric effects and the aerial perspective.

Painting by Vladimir London, Watercolor Academy tutor

It is one of the main methods and is indispensable when it comes to the Alla-Prima technique, which will be explained later in this article.

As described by its name, in the wet-into-wet method the artwork surface must be kept shiny, satin or moist when painting. In this method, less water needs to be loaded onto the brush. To control the amount of water loaded, you can paint with sable or synthetic brushes instead of squirrel, which gives and takes more paint.

Sketch by Vladimir London, Watercolor Academy tutor

When painting wet-into-wet, the artist introduces different colored mixes in the first wash. The paint flows and intermixes on the paper, creating soft edges and gradations between colors. The key here is to predict and manage the flow.

Sketch by Vladimir London, Watercolor Academy tutor

It is a beginner's mistake to paint on soaked paper. If the paint flows into puddles of water it is very difficult to keep the flow under control. A professional artist only keeps the paper as wet as necessary for gentle mixing of the paint. This is the key skill to develop for the wet-into-wet painting technique.

Watercolor paint dries on paper quite quickly. To keep working in this technique, the surface can be sprayed with clean water using an atomizer or by adding more tint mix. If the edge of a painted area dries, it can be quite challenging, if not impossible, to soften it up enough to continue the natural gradation of colors.

To learn how to paint in watercolor, enroll now