my little versailles

Day job related test: Moulin du Roy's paper by kineko

Edit: Sweet mother of the Muses, okay, I find these picture plastered on EVERY russian art supplies selling site I see, sometimes with the watermark, wometimes without so let me be clear: You CAN use this picture on your art supplies website ON THE CONDITION of NOT removing the watermark AND adding my name and website in a VISIBLE place: Valériane Duvivier : valeriane.org If you do not, I will know. And I will go all Baba Yaga on you. Edit en français: Sainte mère des Muses, ok, je trouve cette image sur TOUS les sites de ventes de matos artistique russe, parfois avec la watermark, parfois sans, donc soyons clair: Je vous AUTORISE a mettre cette image sur vos sites de vente de matériel en ligne A LA CONDITION de ne PAS retirer le watermark et d'ajouter de manière VISIBLE mon nom et mon site : Valériane Duvivier: valeriane.org Si vous ne le faites pas, je le saurais. Et je vous tomberais dessus en mode Baba Yaga. --- For today's day job related test, I'll review the new watercolor paper from canson: Moulin du Roy!One the best peck of working in an art store is all these test sheet I can.. er.. liberate. So what about this new paper? A few things.1: It's 100% cotton. Sure, it may seem it's a little thing but paper made with wood contain lignin, an acidic component which degrade the quality of paper over time (it's probably more complicated than that, but keep in mind I'm french and never did science in english). A good quality watercolor paper should be made with either cotton or clothes.2: It's way cheaper than Arches. Sure Arches is the Roll Royces of watercolor paper, but I'm cheap. We all are.3: It's way better than Montval (except that I like the Montval rough texture but it's a post for another day)4: It's not whiter than white. Well at least, it hasn't been.. er... Whitened? Not chemically at least. (yeah, I'm all for environment, I switched my paintbrushes to goat hair and synthetic the day I learned what exactly is Petit-Gris)5: Exist in 140lb. But only in 140lb. No other weight for the moment. But let's get a bit more into the technical aspect. Here are three pictures made with the same watercolor ( a mix of cotman student and sennelier l'aquarelle) with my pentel aquash brushes.Left to right: Rough, Cold pressed and Hot pressed.Rough is really REALLY rough. I don't think I ever worked on a texture that rough already. And as usual, I really don't like this texture. Sure, it resist water and washes like a freaking BOAT, but the surface feel too rough for my technic. It's good for background and texture, not so well for line art. So, not the paper fault, just a personal preference.Cold pressed, now, I'm more used to it. I usually work on this kind of paper and while it a bit rougher than usual, I still manage to use it without too much problem. My indigo did some interesting effect on the blue washes but the surface resisted the numerous coat needed to shade the skin. So a good point for me, I'm a bit of a barbarian with my paintbrushes.Hot pressed now is the disappointment of the day. I like hot pressed paper. It doesn't  absorb water and pigment like the cold pressed or rough paper, but I usually like the effect more.And... well... I couldn't manage to mix the colors and to shade off the skin as I wanted. Look at this horrideous pink background. The gradient is awful. Strangely, the hot pressed paper dried a lot quicker than usual, it may have been because I was at my Dad's place and it was blissfully warm, but the painting dried too quickly. To resume the situation:Rough: still not for me. But it could be interesting to play around with texture.Hot pressed: Oh for the love of the Muse: NO. Or at least, not for washes.Cold pressed: BRING IT ON BABY! No, more seriously, once the prices will be final at work, I'll see if I can afford a whole pad of these on the long term. I would recommend this paper for a good middle ground between student quality paper and Arches or Fabriano Artistico. ---Aujourd'hui, pour le test du boulot, je vais parler du nouveau papier aquarelle de Canson: Moulin du Roy!Un des trucs les plus géniaux quand on travaille dans un magasin d 'art, ce sont tous ces échantillons que je peux... heu... libérer.Bon alors qu'est ce qu'il a ce nouveau papier? Plusieurs choses.1: C'est du 100% coton. Ok, ca peut sembler mineur, mais en réalité, ça a son importance. Le papier fait de bois contient de la lignine, un composant acide qui dégrade le papier au fil du temps (bon c'est technique, ne m'en demandez pas plus). Un papier de bonne qualité devrait être fait avec du coton ou du tissu pour éviter ça.2: Il est bien moins cher qu'Arches. Je sais, Arches, c'est la Roll Royces du papier aquarelle, mais je suis fauchée. On l'es tous.3: C'est bieeeeeen mieux que Montval (sauf que j'aime bien la texture de Montval torchon, mais c'est un post pour un autre jour)4: Il n'est pas plus blanc que blanc. En tout cas, il n'a pas été reblanchi chimiquement (oui j'aime protéger l'environnement, je suis passée aux pinceaux en poils de chèvres et synthétique le jour ou j'ai découvert ce que sont les petit-gris. Indice: On parle pas des escargots)5: Existe en 300 g/m². Et seulement dans cette épaisseur. Rien d'autre pour le moment. Bon, maintenant passons un peu à l'aspect technique. Voici trois peintures faites avec la même aquarelle (un mélange d'étude Cotman et d'Aquarelle Sennelier), et mes pinceaux Aquash de Pentel.De gauche à droite: Grain torchon, grain fin et grain satiné.Le torchon est VRAIMENT rugueux. Je ne crois pas avoir déjà bosser sur un grain aussi prononcé. Et comme d'hab, je n'aime pas ça. Bon c'est vrai que ce grain résiste à l'eau et aux lavis comme un nom de d'la de BATEAU, mais la surface du papier est trop accidentée pour ma technique. C'est chouette pour les décors et les textures, mais pas terrible pour le dessin au trait. En gros, c'est pas la faute au papier, juste une préférence personnelle.Le grain fin, par contre, j'y suis plus habituée. C'est le grain sur lequel je travaille habituellement et j'ai put bosser sur celui ci sans trop de problème d'adaptation. Mon indigo a fait des effet intéressant sur le lavis bleu mais la surface du papier a bien résisté aux nombreuses couches passées pour ombrer la peau. un bon point pour moi, je suis un peu une barbare avec mes pinceaux.Et enfin le grain satin, ce fut la déception du jour. J'aime bien le satiné d'habitude, d'accor,d ça n'absorbe pas l'eau et les pigments comme le grain torchon et fin, mais je préfère dessiner avec.Sauf que là.. Ben, pas moyen. Je ne suis pas arrivée à mélanger les couleurs et faire des dégradés correct. Nan mais matez moi cet horrible fond rose quoi... Étonnement, le papier satiné a séché plus vite que d'habitude, c'est peut être que j'étais chez mon père et qu'il y fait toujours super chaud, mais la peinture a sécher trop vite. Donc en résumé:Torchon: Toujours pas pour moi. Mais ça pourrait être intéressant de s'amuser à faire des textures avec.Grain satin: Oh pour l'amour de sMuses: NON. Ou en tout cas, pas avec des lavis.Grain fin: OH QUE OUI! Non plus sérieusement, dès que le prix découverte sera passé, je verrais si je peux me le mettre au budget 2014. En tout cas, je recommande ce papier pour un bon milieu entre le papier d'étude et Arches ou Fabriano artistico.

Earth

••Earth was meant to ground, but sometimes it took you under.

The earth was a relic. Seeped into the pores of its mantle were the memories left by all the souls that had come before. These imprints of life circulated through the rocks, sands, trees and clays that had stood the test of time. While people went absently about their day, touches they made left behind a history that most wouldn’t see.

But one might say I could go through the looking glass.

I’d first encountered my connection to earth when I was six. It had happened during a daily ritual that was nothing out of the ordinary:  the walk home from school. There was a cemetery that Birdie and I passed every day along the way. In the vibrancy of a spring at its peak, I had been drawn by the green.

The grass was so vividly colored and the blades begged for the trample of bare feet. I’d kicked my shoes off and couldn’t wait to dispose of my socks to run past the fence with abandon. The birds were chirping, the air was alive with the hum of bees and the sun was making the flowers dewy. I remember the feeling of my smile that pivotal moment before my foot landed on the sod, squishing under my toes and ….

The images came at me as if I was thrust into a dark tunnel at warp speed… skeletal remains filling in with faces before their memories came into view with an acceleration that was dizzying. There was no exit, no safe direction to turn;  I was lost in a plume of inescapable, terrifying imagery.

Each step triggered a landmine, images exploding and erasing the setting of present with rapid fire reels of the past. I heard my own blood-curdling screams but not even their force could pull me out of the nightmarish reverie. Birdie had quickly lifted me to rescue, retrieving me from maelstrom I had unknowingly entered, drawn by the colors of spring and completely carefree. The terror had lasted for less than a minute, but to me it felt like eons and in the aftershocks I had stumbled into a fear that wouldn’t settle, turning me tentative when it came to parks and playgrounds.

It was a fortunate circumstance that not all ground was hallowed and I had eventually conquered my fear of being barefoot. Time, experimentation and the careful guidance of my grandmother had provided the invisible map needed to navigate another anomaly that was intrinsically part of me.  

My grandma had taken me to the ocean when I was a little older, but not yet a young woman.  I’d slipped out of my sandals and took a tentative step into the sand and had been overwhelmed with excitement and glee. I had been met with so much joy and playfulness that I had fallen to giggles as we’d made our way to the shoreline.

As a day-dreamy teenager I had found a tree; the canopy had offered me shade from hot sun in the precursor to summer and was a quiet spot out of the fray where I could study. In leaning against it, shoulder bare in the heat of summer, I was whisked into an image of a boy that had propped a hand against it as he had dipped down to give a girl her first kiss. The memory lived in the ring of the year it had happened and my contact with the bark had drawn it out from the roots.

Birdie had always had a knack for gardening and making home medicinals. She self-educated by pouring through books in hours spent at the library and then more at home. There were nights her mortar and pestle were subjected to hours of abuse so that she might find the cure for a headache or a balm to sooth a bruise. I was her willing guinea pig and participant in her daydreams. It was not lost on me that she may have been in search of a secret remedy to ease the parts of me that were harder to cope with.  

A deeper connection to earth was discovered in the garden. Birdie cultivated everything she used in her potions and lotions. She readily involved me in her every passion and whim. I was her constant companion and she was mine.  My green thumb grew every year along with my inches and it was in new growth I had discovered the wonder of my connection to life. A newborn bloom or tender sproutling held in its small but mighty roots... potential.  Unburdened by age, they posed no threat to my enhanced senses, instead bringing the refreshing perspective that came with new beginnings.  I lost hours to running my fingers along the herbs in the garden, and the flowers along the fences. It was a world of my own:  Raine in Wonderland.

And then… something even deeper.

My connection to the earth extended beyond reading its memories like pages in a picture book, and as with the more harrowing happenings, it had been stumbled upon quite by surprise. While out in our garden, the drying leaves of a plant at the corner of the bed had caught my attention. I ran my fingertips over the foliage, the ones past rescue fluttering to the soil just below. I had been confounded by the single struggling plant surrounded by all others lush and robust.

“Birdie, why isn’t this one well?”

Walking over to pat her gentle reassurance on my shoulder, my grandmother had been quick to answer. “Sometimes, my darling Raine, it is just a matter of the survival of the fittest.”

“Can we let it be until all the leaves have fallen?”

She had answered me with a decisive nod before flitting around to prune and feed and pick things in her garden. I’d whispered to the plant my sorries for its struggle to grow and then continued about my other business.

The next morning brought a miracle. I’d decided that the plant deserved company every day so that it wouldn’t be sad about losing its leaves. Skipping straight to it, that very next day, my eyes had immediately gone wide and I’d questioned what I was seeing. “Birdie! Look! Look!”

I remember very clearly she had wiped her hands on her gardening apron and hurried over then her jaw had gone slack. The plant that could have been a long lost relative to Charlie Brown’s Christmas tree had filled out and grown up while we slept. That was the day I found I had a literal green thumb. Or maybe it was more than just a thumb…  

This inexplicable gift and my undying love of Birdie’s garden had inspired my own passions and drove me to pursue a double-major of plant science and plant biology. My path had illuminated towards a future in botany with a healthy knack for horticulture on the side. There was not a question in my mind of what I wanted to do once I was old enough to understand it.

Birdie was an absolute sponge and my number one study partner throughout my schooling. We applied my education to her ingenuity and fervor for the field. Combined we were a powerhouse. We created remedies and therapies and indulgent home spa treatments with herbs and flowers and oils.

In my mind the earth still held untapped and untold potential.

I was motivated in my studies, excelled and graduated in exactly four years. A typical experience for someone who was less than typical. I don’t think Birdie had ever been so proud as the day I crossed the stage. We’d celebrated my accomplishment with an elaborate farm-to-table meal that we made together, complete with homemade vanilla bean ice cream and our very own tea.  There was a hint of nutmeg in the aromatic blend - an irresistible detail that had been my idea. I had always loved the scent of nutmeg, it had an amazing quality of home, earthy and grounding with that je ne sais quoi.

After schooling, it had been my determination to have a business plan drawn up and secure a loan to bring Birdie’s apothecary to life.  Most every thing had been in place as far as framework went when my grandmother had fallen at the the hands of a stroke… It was then I had shifted from entrepreneur to caregiver, despite the protests of Birdie herself.  Sadly there were some afflictions the derivatives of earth could not fix…

Eventually, in Venice Beach, the dream would be realized. Birdie wouldn’t be there for the moment I found my place, or when I had brushed it to new life with paint,  but she had been there before, when we had ordered the prototypes for our original line of inventory. I would carry other brands, but our featured line came from her as much as it did me. She knew I was moving forward before she said a silent farewell and drifted into a sleep from which she would not wake. My grief was deep and by some measure, would always remain a part of me. Perhaps this was the way the heart tried to fill the void left by absence of someone you loved unconditionally.  

Happiness had arrived in a box a few short weeks later. I didn’t have to guess at its contents but that didn’t dull my anticipation to get to what was inside at all, quite the opposite. I didn’t bother with scissors, instead catching an edge of the tape that had lifted and ripping it free of the cardboard. The jade colored bottles were so rich and perfect in their jeweled tone, I had actually squealed my delight, which was certainly not my style. In those moments, I felt so much joy and a connection to my Birdie that defied description.  It was then my mourning had altered, morphing into something less lonely and more hopeful.

That very first box was the front seat passenger in my otherwise solo drive to my next destination.  I’d not left it in the car when I arrived, opting to carry it up the three steps of the storefront instead of going ahead to unlock the door. To me this was symbolic, the next best thing to my grandmother’s fingers joined with mine as we crossed the threshold.

Now, weeks later, my apothecary, with its fresh coat of paint, was taking on its shape and personality. A newly constructed greenhouse was its neighbor to the back, already filled with plants which were mostly from clippings that came from Birdie’s garden back home. Her legacy lived in their roots and my gift would ensure their eternity.  

Inside, the walls had been painted a soothing shade of grey, and razor thin glass shelves jutted out proudly from the walls.  The flooring had yet to be completed, for that would be the final touch for a specific element that had been non negotiable to me. As it were, many may have found it premature to set up any display.  I, however, could not resist the pull I had to see those jewel-toned bottles out of their box and adorning the shelves.  One by one I had taken them out, stopping to open each cap and indulge in their scents before I set them in the center shelves of the left wall, Birdie had been left handed.  Not a moment after I’d placed the last bottle I was beaming and welling with pride.  The emotion of that moment washed over me with a power that defied description; I suppose that might actually be normal when on the precipice of realizing a lifelong dream.

Survival of the fittest, my grandma had said so long ago in the garden, and Birdie had certainly survived.  Birdie was right there in the contents of those bottles, displayed with a graceful strength and purposeful dignity, the very essence of who she had been.

The earth could take you under…

… but it could also set you to bloom. ••