Cézanne Mould-Made Watercolor Paper #Hahnemühle_USA #Hahnemühle #CézanneMouldMadeWatercolor #zebrapenus #danielsmithwatercolor

 What a great fun piece of art to make!

Recently, the Hahnemühle paper company sent me

several samples of their art paper product to try out

and product review. 

I'm not ready to do that review just yet,

but this would be step number one in that process. 

This pad of paper is their 

Cézanne Mould-made Watercolor, Surface Sized paper.

It is cold pressed, acid free, age resistant,

natural white and 100% cotton rag.

At 140 lbs, this paper was perfect for what 

I wanted to try!

 For color I pulled out several tubes of

Daniel Smith Extra-Fine Watercolors,

a cup of water and a watercolor paintbrush. 

Here are the colors I used:

duo chrome emerald,

green gold,

pyrrole orange,

duo chrome cactus flower,

duo chrome mauve, and

from LeFranc Bourgeois - bateaux violet.

Working with totally dry paper,

I added water to my colors on a palette to get

them good and watery,

then started swirling swatches of color onto

the paper with a wet brush. 

 I overlapped colors till I liked the arrangement.

Next I added some clean water rings and drops

onto the colored swirls,

blotted a few areas with a paper towel.

I spattered some water droplets with a fan brush, 

then waited till it was dry.

Typically I use a heat gun to dry the color,

but it tends to push heat rings and I didn't

want that technique with this page.

Hence the natural air drying.

I used a Sarasa Fineliner from Zebra Pen

and started making swirly, spiral-y lines.

And I thickened some areas.

Easy peasy to do.

I am an Artist Ambassador for Zebra,

so I should mention these pens are my go-to

for any art I do.

Good coverage, dark black color, and easy to handle.

This particular Cézanne cold press was a little

"bumpier" and "rougher" than I normally tangle on.

Next I want to try my Sarasas on the hot pressed

Cézanne so I can compare. 

 I stayed with colors that might pass for flowers,

so much fun!

And I watched several episodes of Gotham while I worked.

A win/win all around!

I wasn't sure until this point how I was going to address the greens.

They could be fill areas,

or they could pass for foliage,

or leaves.

Printemps!

That is my tangle of choice when I get stuck,

so it worked just awesomely for the leafy,

foliage-y, need-to-be-filled-in areas.

And before I knew it, season 2 of Gotham was done,

and my artwork was complete. 

Ok, how did I like the way the paper reacted?

This Cézanne worked like a dream for accepting the color.

It helped that it is 140 pounds in weight,

but a bonus that I haven't really worked with before

is the whole "block" idea.

What?

I didn't mention that before?

Yep! 

The pad of Cézanne is both glued and gauzed along

all four sides to ensure the sheet stays flat when it's wet. 

I admit I did have a bit of an issue removing the page

from the pad - probably because I had not done this before

and didn't do it correctly.

If you slide a palette knife under a corner,

you can easily slip it along the edges and remove

this page. 

I used a dull knife and . . . 

yeah, that didn't work so awesomely.

My fault. Not the fault of the paper.

The fine grain and structure of the paper allowed for

excellent flow of my Daniel Smith colors. 

And don't you just love the shimmer and shine of those duo chrome colors?

My Sarasa Fineliner gave excellent coverage and pulled the whole piece together.

Cézanne, Daniel Smith and Zebra.

A winning combination all the way around.

Now to try that hot pressed Cézanne.