PRACTICAL
Painting en plein air, directly from the view in front of you, is rewarding, educational, difficult and fascinating. It is not a copying-a-photo-ina-studio situation. It is painting reality right in front of you in the atmospheric conditions you are in at that moment. Painting inside, in a studio, is safe, warm or cool, comfortable, with nice seating and food and drink readily available. You can take your time in relative comfort. Painting outside is often not comfortable but it is so much more beneficial in that it teaches you how to really handle watercolour.
Painting outside is painting in the elements so allowances must be made for anything that turns up like drizzle, rain, wind, hot sun, no shade, pests, insects, crowds of onlookers, noise, and my personal pet hate, tripping overthe sky wash you’ve just done. Actually, thinking about it, quite a lot can go wrong.
