Watercolor on Collage Papers?! These WON’T Run and Move Around!

Added: 2026-06-03

[00:00:00]So, one thing I'm really enjoying right now is using collage papers in which I have made botanical figures with watercolor. So, as you can see in this one, this piece of paper right here, these as well.

[00:00:14]This up here, those were all done with watercolor. I believe this one and possibly this one. So, I'm using these a lot and I really enjoy them, but one of the tricky things about it is it's watercolor. You're going to put some medium on it that is going to activate that watercolor and it may move around.

[00:00:33]So, I wanted to show you how I make these papers with watercolor and then let them dry and then seal them into place so I never have to worry about them moving when I'm in the midst of making my paintings. I'm going to use just a couple of brushes that when they're wet come to a really nice point.

[00:00:56]So, as you can see, this brush has a really nice point on it that I can make some of these botanical figures with.

[00:01:04]I'm going to pull out my watercolors and I also need some paper. I like this medical exam paper because it's economical, it comes in bulk, it really does a great job of disappearing when I put it onto my paintings. So, I'm just going to tear off a piece here.

[00:01:24]And I'm just going to start with random marks that look somewhat like botanicals.

[00:01:31]The colors that I like to use are not necessarily colors that will come straight out of this. So, I do a lot of mixing to make shades or to maybe mix colors together, maybe desaturate them a bit, and that gives me the colors I'm looking for.

[00:01:49]But you don't have to use one of these if you want to just go straight from the pan, you certainly can.

[00:01:54]And I'll do this.

[00:01:57]I'm going to mix some of this green into the orange that I had here.

[00:02:03]And I'm just going to lightly brush it across the paper. I don't want I don't personally like anything that looks too definite.

[00:02:13]So, I'm just going to be very loose about this.

[00:02:19]And of course, you don't have to make botanical shapes or figures. You can make random ones as you as you can see.

[00:02:29]Um and this, you know, as long as you're using watercolor, this this will work in the same way.

[00:02:41]Okay. Join me August 27th through 29th in Nashville for 3 days of creating expressive layers. We'll learn to make so many different kinds of collage paper, use acrylic mediums, mark making, and glazing so that you can make your own expressive layers.

[00:02:58]I'm going to look at this palette right here. What's predominant is sort of a blue-green color, and then I've got some red-violet that really shows up throughout this.

[00:03:10]And there's a bit of this yellowish-green.

[00:03:14]I'm going to stay maybe into that sort of family and see if I can't make something that would be fitting on that painting.

[00:03:23]So, I'm going to get some water on my brush.

[00:03:26]And I'm going to go into this sort of really bright-looking red-violet color.

[00:03:37]But I'm going to add a little bit of black to it.

[00:03:40]Maybe even a little bit of that green.

[00:03:46]Get some water on my brush.

[00:03:48]You can make these as pigmented or as pale as you want.

[00:03:54]So, I'm just using my brush in different ways. Before I used the point, now I'm sort of using the side and I'm just going to make some marks here that look loosely like uh some petals.

[00:04:13]I like it when it looks a bit random and not as predictable. So, I try to not get too thinky thinky about what I'm doing here. I just try to make random marks, see what happens. There's nothing precious going on here. I can just throw this piece of paper away. So, it's really safe to just go with my impulse of the moment.

[00:04:35]So, as you can see, I'm getting variations of this pink.

[00:04:40]And because I can tear this paper apart, I can just use a lot of different colors here and make some marks in the open spaces cuz I won't be using this all together.

[00:04:52]I'll add in some green to these. So, I think I have made good use of a lot of my paper here. And now, what I'm going to do is lay this on my drawing rack and you really need to lay it where it's flat, air can get to it. So, I'm going to let this dry and then we'll go from there.

[00:05:12]So, just to give you an idea about why you want to seal these, I'm just going to tear off one of these cute little designs and I happened to choose one that had quite a good little build-up of that watercolor pigment. So, what I'm going to do, since this is not sealed, I'm just going to put this on this scrap piece of paper like I would on a painting.

[00:05:43]So, you can see what happens if it's not sealed and the problems you can run into. So, I start to put the medium over the top.

[00:05:58]But, if I do like I normally would, then that's going to get activated. And then as I start to spread it out, you can see how that color can start running and it So, then it just adds color everywhere and you can't control it.

[00:06:16]So, now I just have some matte fluid medium. I'm going to get a very large shaper tool. But, you you could do this with a brush. I just like using a shaper tool because I think I use less medium that way cuz it doesn't get all stuck down in the bristles of the brush and I can also cover a large area and I can I can cover it without having to keep going back over these little figures.

[00:06:43]So, I'm just going to put some medium here and I'm just going to go over these little botanical figures. Now, I'm not going to go over them a lot because again, I don't want to activate them and it just doesn't take a lot of medium.

[00:07:08]So, as long as you get a coat on there, it's good.

[00:07:24]There.

[00:07:25]Done. Now, I can hang this up to dry.

[00:07:29]See, I missed one over here. You can kind of look just uh for the sheen to see if maybe uh you didn't get some of them.

[00:07:42]But, that should do it.

[00:07:47]If the paper tears a little bit, it's all right. It won't ruin it. Okay, I'll hang this up.

[00:07:52]So now, these are sealed, they're dry, and they're ready to use. So, let's look at what they look like and act like in a practical sense. I'm going to use this painting. I feel like I just need a little bit of movement off this way.

[00:08:09]This is all pretty muted, and I want it to stay that way. I think what I'm going to do is maybe try this one here.

[00:08:17]So, I just got a little water on my brush. I'm running it around the figure, and it helps it tear easier.

[00:08:30]Yeah.

[00:08:45]So, it did, indeed, with these additions of these watercolor pieces, it gave me a better movement. Gave me a better movement throughout the whole painting.

[00:08:59]And that I can work with.

[00:09:03]So, now I'm I'll just go back to my old process of seeing what needs [music] to come forward, what needs to go back, and just keep working with this piece.

[00:09:13]I hope you enjoy [music] adding watercolors to your collage papers, and as always, thanks for spending your precious time with me.