Learning to Watercolor Paint During Shelter-in-Place

Sometimes, an outside source, however grave, can topple our routines and drive us to inspiration.

Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein after a volcano eruption led to a frosty summer and three years of famine, epidemics,  political revolts, and a pandemic. (Squirrel! Cue great song about that: “1816, The Year Without A Summer”). During a plague,

And I learned to watercolor paint under quarantine.

The COVID-19 shelter-in-place directive forced me to stop doing whatever mundane tasks usually slurped my time and shoved my creative yearnings to the tippy top of my to-do lists.

It somehow gave me license to relax. To get creative. To piddle.

I haven’t written a famous horror book nor have I invented a crucial mathematical formula for the ages, but I have rediscovered my want of learning to watercolor paint. I feel embarrassed that I never found time.

More than a year ago, I signed up for monthly watercolor kits from Let’s Make Art. When they arrived, I gazed at them and then stacked them neatly away for another day—whenever that is.

To date, I’ve painted a rainbow unicorn, a blue octopus, a snowy owl, a treetop, and hydrangeas.

Did I mention I don’t know how to watercolor paint? And yet somehow, I did.

Let’s Make Art taught me. They supply watercolor kits and provide instructional videos. I am having so much fun!

I follow along with Sarah Cray of Let’s Make Art making brush marks and water puddles. I smear this, squiggle that, wet it here, dollop there, sprinkle salt (ooh!) and when I’m done, I have a picture. I don’t know how it happens.

I love its abstractness—its imperfection. I love how you can never recreate something because each piece is unique.

I love the texture. I love the colors. I love the water rings. And I especially love how salt creates psychedelic stains! (Look closely at the treetop painting below).

I’m having so much fun, I resubscribed so I will receive four new projects a month. Not only that, I subscribed to Let’s Make Art’s art journaling box, too! It includes everything you need in the box to create journaling art—pens, paste, specialized paper, journal books, and crafts.

I never thought I could learn to produce something even worthy of refrigerator art. I thought it would take years. Perhaps that’s why I never started. The reward seemed so far down the road. I thought it too big a commitment.

But, I’ve only painted five times—ever. I am not an artist.

If you yearn to paint, don’t wait for a catastrophic event. Just subscribe and paint away.

Recent instructional videos are on the Let’s Make Art website and all others are on their Let’s Make Art YouTube Channel. You don’t have to subscribe to watch. Their instructions are free. And their products are topnotch. I’ve ordered several paints and brushes and they are better quality and less expensive than those on Amazon or in craft stores.

Give it a go why don’t you? I’d love to see your art!

Thank you Let’s Make Art!

Happy painting! And stay safe!

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Click pictures for slideshow.