Monthly Archives: September 2009

I’m so excited for autumn (my favorite season), that this next painting came right out of my head. OK, this one is easy for everyone, I promise! You can do this watercolor painting, no problem,  just in time for the harvest too…

Step 1: Make a rough sketch on watercolor paper with your pencil. This little watercolor painting is only 4×6 inches. When sketching remember, you can draw your harvest moon in the center of the paper, but draw your kitty off-center just to give your painting more interest. If your fence was in the center, and your moon was in the center, and your kitty too, the painting would have poor composition. It doesn’t matter how well you paint, if your composition is boring it will ruin the whole thing.

Here is my layout. I just wanted to show everyone that it doesn’t take much to create a wonderful painting. I used 2 of the brushes shown, some watercolor paints, a cut out water bottle with water for my brushes, and some watercolor paper.Keep it easy.

Step 2: Mask out the moon and stars with a little masking fluid (orange). Let it completely dry before continuing.

Step 3: Paint the sky. Here I used ultramarine blue and a touch of alizarin crimson. Don’t be shy, paint right over those stars.

Step 4: Next, paint the fence using your sky color on your pallet plus a little brown. It will make a lovely gray/blue color. Quickly paint the fence, then take a sharp edge and scrape out the fence lines. Next take blue, green, and red and mix it to create a wonderful black for the kitty.

Step 5: Remove the masking fluid. Take a thin rigger brush and make some wood grain in the fence with your gray mixture on your pallet. Notice the jagged edges on the moon…don’t worry about that, I’ll show you how to fix it…

Step 6: Now the moon never has rough edges, it’s perfectly round. What do we do now? Just take a small clean bristle brush with water and scrub out the outer edge of the moon. When your brush gets dirty, just rinse it off with clean water and pat on a paper towel. You can do the same steps to the kitty to make him a little smoother too.

Harvest Moon Kitty - watercolor

Step 7 Final: Next, I painted the outer edge of the moon in naples yellow. While that was still wet, I painted the inside of the moon cadmium orange to make the best harvest moon ever! With my black micron pen, I outlined the kitty and the fence.

What do you think harvest moon kitty is looking for?
Harvest mice? Maybe, maybe not.

This painting is an original – not a copy and can be yours for $20. The back side of this painting is a blank postcard and can be mailed by you to whomever you wish.

“Harvest Moon Kitty”
original watercolor
4×6
no mat, no frame
$20
(includes shipping and tax in US)

click here to purchase, it will take you to my available watercolors for sale site.

I hope you enjoyed this step by step watercolor demonstration on how to paint a harvest moon kitty.