MOSI Grey - Manchester Science Museum

Manchester – Painting Grey without a Grey

Manchester has a reputation for rain.
That is unless you live there, and then you realise the lie. Having said that, there are plenty of grey buildings around. Take the fabulous Science Museum. If ever there was a candidate for the use of grey ink, this is it. But I resisted. People often ask my why I use such bright colours.

It’s quite simple really. When I first started creating these pictures I had 8 colours. Magenta, Process cyan, yellow, deep purple, black, white, orange and green. I use the paints neat and rely on them mixing on the page. It means you have to get creative with the process. Like when I did the Barbican, a giant concrete edifice.

Since then, I have discovered there are more subtle and deeper colours available. I’m adding to them to fill the gaps, yet I cannot bring myself to buy a grey quite yet. I always find other colours I NEED more. Plus grey is such a flat colour and there are plenty of muted colours that hint at something more.
Then I go and decide to paint a grey building, with grey pavement and road, like this one.

At this stage, I question why I didn’t as I try to reflect the tones and colours, whilst having only black and white in the right chromatic range. Yes, I could mix them beforehand but that would be too simple, and, I suspect, less interesting. I like to live dangerously…

With paint at least. That means allowing the paint to mix and do what it will with guidance from me, of course.

Creation
The picture is painted on watercolour paper. She draws the lines with masking fluid to a planned arrangement before painting it with a watercolour wash which gets covered with clingfilm. Once this is removed the picture is further developed using acrylic inks which are left to dry before the masking is removed to reveal the final picture.