Alchemy of the Soul

Paper

• Watercolor paper, 300 gms. We use water in some of the lessons, so good paper is essential. I use Canson XL Watercolor 300 gms, a cellulose type paper, that lends itself well to the techniques I show. Cotton paper is also great. I will discuss this in the lessons.
• Sketching paper for graphite sketching. Any drawing paper will do. I draw on watercolor paper throughout the class, but for drawing, I also recommend Fabriano Accademia spiral sketch pad A4.

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Substrate for mounting the watercolor paper

• I like to work on watercolor paper, mounted with painter’s tape on a rigid board. You can however work as you prefer, on a glued watercolor block, or similar. We do use a lot of water so mounting is helpful. So mounting board of a kind plus painter’s tape is great to have.
• Trays for mixing watercolor
• Having some nice mixing trays is very helpful. It doesn’t matter whether they are plastic or porcelain. I use both. In the workshops, I use porcelain, mainly because it’s so beautiful.

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‍Graphite

• Any graphite pencils you have, wooden or mechanical. Ranging from H, F, HB and up to around 6B. I tend to use the brands Faber Castel and Caran D´Ache, but there are many wonderful graphite pencil brands.
• Graphite Stick. I recommend Caran D´ache Graphicube in 9B. This one is raw graphite on the outside (which is what we need) contrary to many, that are waxed or varnished on the outside.

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Gold

• In the class, I use both imitation gold foil, very budget-friendly, and real 24 karat gold foil. Both are wonderful, so choose according to your budget.

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Gold Glue

• Water-based acrylic gold glue. In the lessons, I use the brand La Doratura, but gold glue can be bought from many different brands. Full guidance is in the class. Avoid choosing/buying oil based gold glue for this class as it doesn’t apply to the techniques I show (and is for a completely different adhesion technique).

Watercolor

• I recommend artist quality, but not any particular brand. My box is a mix of many different brands like Schmincke , Maimeri, Daniel Smith, Sennelier, Winsor & Newton etc.
• The specific colors for the class are: Gold and Graphite. You can buy both gold and graphite watercolors from many brands. I use Daniel Smith and Schmincke. The graphite one is called “graphite grey” in both brands.
• Posca Pens, gold and white
• In the class, I also use a few white and gold Posca Pens (any size) for making dots, lines and patterns.

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‍Other Materials

• Kneaded eraser. I use Faber Castell brand
• Eraser pens. I use Tombow Mono Zero round and Faber Castell Perfection pen 7058
• Cotton pad
• Ruler
• Compass
• Pencil Sharpener (remember they blunt quickly so a new one with a fresh blade is good)
• White acrylic ink
• Traditional pen and nib (for adding lines and dots of gold glue)
• Brushes, both for painting, smudging and dusting off gold leaf
• When it comes to watercolor brushes, I am very messy. I use a happy mix of old and new brushes, synthetic and natural hair. Anything will do, so chose what is affordable for you and go for a mix of sizes between 1, 2, 4, 6, 8 and some bigs, 12 or 14. Also it´s good to have some “mop” type makeup brushes. See image for inspiration

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Printing Out References

• In the class, we work with a few reference images. If you have a printer, it is of course nice and luxurious. I print it out on a cheap and very nice photo paper called Canon Matte Photo paper. If you don’t have a printer, however, don’t let this hold you back. You can be inspired directly from your computer screen, and you can make traces of the photos on transparent paper directly from your screen fx with a thin black liner, and then use that to transfer to your watercolor paper. Only imagination is the limit here, so get creative and have fun!