Ink on paper: paintings that work (and what to do with ones that don’t)

Ink on paper can produce some beautiful results - but not all the time! The lipstick colours of Costa Rica - especially the fruits and flowers - are inspiring my palette. Here I share some of the paintings I’ve been making on paper, which as you will see, do not always work out! There are certainly challenges in controlling the media, but even though your mistakes cannot be erased, they will move you forward (as the American abstract painter Richard Diebenkorn noted). Reviewing your work can help artists identify what’s working, what’s not, and where you might like to go next. How do you approach working with watercolour inks? And what do you do with the ones that ‘fail’? What can you learn from the ones that don’t turn out as you intended? See more paintings inspired by Costa Rica here: Sign up for my monthly(ish) newsletter here: