 Trade In this Item for up to £2.50
Get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade in Taking Risks with Watercolour for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £2.50, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Author
Product Description
Product Description
A practical, stimulating and superbly illustrated book for intermediate watercolourists who are looking for greater challenges in their work and who are prepared to experiment with this popular medium.
Shirley Trevena’s watercolours are visually inspiring, vibrant with colour and strong in composition. This book shows what stunning results she achieves and how she does it by taking risks with watercolour. Although watercolour can be a difficult medium to handle, Shirley maintains that you get the best results if you have no sense of fear and just let yourself enjoy watercolour’s fascinating versatility.
Taking you through her paintings from the first concept to the finished watercolour, Shirley explains and illustrates her prize-winning techniques for producing luminous and colourful watercolours. She covers a wide range of topics, encouraging the reader to experiment with vibrant colour, dynamic composition, tone, and bold textures and patterns to produce exciting still life, landscape and flower paintings. She also explains what to do if things go wrong, and how to develop your paintings successfully and move on in your work.
About the Author
Shirley Trevena is a successful watercolour artist, internationally renowned for her paintings of still life, flowers and landscape imagery. She is a member of the Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours and has won several watercolour awards – the Winsor & Newton Award and the Llewellyn Prize. Shirley regularly runs painting workshops and exhibits her work annually at the Mall Galleries, London, and The Orange Steet Gallery, Rutland.
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
70 of 70 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
A truly inspiring book giving an insight into how Shirley Trevena works. Dont buy it if youre looking for a step by step guide to producing a painting- this book is all about giving you the confidence to explore your own style rather than trying to use standard techniques to achieve a `result` as so many other books do.
As a practising artist,I found the book fascinating and a real insight into the authors methods of painting. It fired me up to try new ideas and could do the same for you !
As a practising artist,I found the book fascinating and a real insight into the authors methods of painting. It fired me up to try new ideas and could do the same for you !
47 of 47 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
This is a beautiful book full of pictures of Shirley Trevena's unique and wonderful paintings. Those familiar with her work will also be pleased to see some of her less-known subject matter, such as figures, and landscapes, as well as her fantastic flower and still life paintings. Shirley's rule-free and try-it anything-goes approach to painting is very liberating and inspirational as are the pictures in the book themselves. I was interested to hear the story of how she began painting with watercolours and her initial tribulations with this difficult medium, and this was very heartening for those of us still struggling. You won't regret buying this book.
86 of 88 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
This is simply a beautiful book. I have long admired Shirley Trevena's work, and was so pleased to see a book from her at last. It does not disappoint.
An artist myself for many years, normally a lover of landscapes and abstract art, this book comes near the top of my list for anyone who is serious about their painting - well, even if not, still buy it for the inspiration.
Shirley takes the most difficult of mediums, watercolour, and works magic with it. She takes the most deadly of subjects, still life, and makes it vibrantly interesting. She breaks all the rules of perspective, technique (backruns and blobs look beautiful), and truly does take risks. The results are amazing - despite having bought the accompanying video, and read the book from cover to cover, I know that I could never produce work like this if I tried for the rest of my life. Normally this would put me off buying a book, yet here the work is not 'looking down on us from a great height'; the subjects are familiar, it looks as though it MIGHT be achievable - at some undefined point in the distant future!
This is not a book for the beginner - it doesn't take you through the usual range of exercises designed to start you off in watercolour. There are thousands of books out there that will do that, (and you still won't be able to do it!)
The author is an artist of great ability and experience. She does not patronise the reader, is honest about showing us the way she works, the little tricks she might use to get the effect she wants - without being at all gimmicky. Her work might look as though she has thrown it all together in a few hours, but this is very far from the case.
She is still developing new ways of working, going in new directions,(landscape, printmaking), even returning to her beginnings as a figure painter. I hope she will continue to produce these fabulously unique and inspirational watercolours as well.
Buy the book! You can't fail to love it.
An artist myself for many years, normally a lover of landscapes and abstract art, this book comes near the top of my list for anyone who is serious about their painting - well, even if not, still buy it for the inspiration.
Shirley takes the most difficult of mediums, watercolour, and works magic with it. She takes the most deadly of subjects, still life, and makes it vibrantly interesting. She breaks all the rules of perspective, technique (backruns and blobs look beautiful), and truly does take risks. The results are amazing - despite having bought the accompanying video, and read the book from cover to cover, I know that I could never produce work like this if I tried for the rest of my life. Normally this would put me off buying a book, yet here the work is not 'looking down on us from a great height'; the subjects are familiar, it looks as though it MIGHT be achievable - at some undefined point in the distant future!
This is not a book for the beginner - it doesn't take you through the usual range of exercises designed to start you off in watercolour. There are thousands of books out there that will do that, (and you still won't be able to do it!)
The author is an artist of great ability and experience. She does not patronise the reader, is honest about showing us the way she works, the little tricks she might use to get the effect she wants - without being at all gimmicky. Her work might look as though she has thrown it all together in a few hours, but this is very far from the case.
She is still developing new ways of working, going in new directions,(landscape, printmaking), even returning to her beginnings as a figure painter. I hope she will continue to produce these fabulously unique and inspirational watercolours as well.
Buy the book! You can't fail to love it.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Fantastic tips to learn
I like very much this book.It gave me a lot of new ideas and some new tips to teach to my students.
Very nice and lively way to work watercolors
Very nice and lively way to work watercolors
Published 2 months ago by Berit Hals
Taking risks with Watercolour
This is an excellent introduction to watercolour painting for those with a real interest in the medium. Read more
Published 5 months ago by I. Fraser
Great book to inspire new and experienced painters
This book is great, it had already been recommended to me by a friend. I have recently started painting and was looking for inspiration on trying more techniques and approaching... Read more
Published 7 months ago by Di
Risk taken
This has been an eye opener re watercolouring. I now have 3 of Shirley Trevenas books/DVD and have found them inspirational. Read more
Published 11 months ago by GrannieMo
Excellent
A great book for getting you outside of your box, trying new things and mixing other media with watercolours. Read more
Published 12 months ago by Kate
Very inspiring !
I have never written a book review before but feel this book really deserves one.
I am relatively new to watercolour ( have been studying botanical illustration - great but... Read more
I am relatively new to watercolour ( have been studying botanical illustration - great but... Read more
Published 12 months ago by Pixie
more than pleased
more than pleased. I have read the book twice and cant wait to try and paint with shirleys suggestions.
Published 15 months ago by flower
Taking risks with watercolour
Shirley Trevena gives a clear and fascinating insight to the way she works. Her paintings are magical and the book is a must for those who would like to try her ideas. Read more
Published 23 months ago by Jelly
Taking Risks with Watercolour
This is a lovely book to have in one's collection. Shirley Trevena's vibrant watercolours are truly inspirational. Read more
Published on 2 Jun 2010 by J. L. Dixon
a book you come back to
An awful lot of watercolourists own this book. It is too easy when you begin to paint to be caught up in recreating realism. Read more
Published on 9 Mar 2010 by Rosyparrott
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
