Shropshire based watercolour artist, Helen Parry specialises in watercolour paintings, using a challenging and unique pure watercolour technique. Each painting has an unparalleled depth of colour and vibrancy producing a beautiful and colourful final piece. Additionally, Helen’s delicate brushwork which has its own story, reveals outstanding and exceptional fine detail in every watercolour painting. Helen truly thrives on the technical difficulties that watercolour painting provides.
Helen is a self-taught artist who has always had a passion for art and painting. Over the years, Helen has continued to draw and grasped at the opportunity to go back to full-time painting. The beautiful rural countryside and nature found in Shropshire has been the catalyst for much of her work.
Original Watercolour Paintings |
Helen Parry’s watercolour paintings are highly collectable and feature in private collections worldwide and a unique watercolour painting of Helen’s would make a stunning addition to your collection or home. Owning an original watercolour painting, provides a unique view into Helen’s pure watercolour technique. This pure watercolour technique involves no black pigment or white paint, moreover no masking fluid is used in any of Helen’s paintings. All the colours in one of Helen’s paintings are created from using just the primary colours of red, yellow and blue.
Helen takes inspiration and admires work from the likes of American watercolour artist, Andrew Wyeth, she loves the sense of mood captured in his paintings alongside the simple compositions. For landscape paintings, Helen enjoys work by both Allan Ingham and Helen Attingham. Helen also appreciates the subtle tones and movement created in paintings by Albrecht Durer. However, this list of artists could go on!
Fine Art Giclee Prints |
In addition to original watercolour paintings, Helen’s images are available as fine art, archival, giclée prints. There is a choice of both open and limited editions prints, in addition to various size options. All of Helen’s limited edition giclee prints are produced on St Cuthberts Mill Enhanced Somerset Velvet fine art paper and are supplied with a certificate of authenticity. All other giclee prints are printed on heavy weight, fine art giclee paper and are signed and stamped by Helen.
Watercolour Sketches |
From her rural, garden-based studio overlooking the Shropshire Hills, Helen has studied and sketched the rolling landscape and flowers in addition to the local wildlife including; garden birds, foxes, squirrels and deer. She has gained an in-depth understanding of the subjects she paints. Helen Parry also writes a blog to share her painting escapades, the painting process and the quirky wildlife she meets including stunning garden birds. From time to time, Helen releases original plein air watercolour sketches for sale. They are painted as an initial study of a subject, for a future, larger watercolour painting.
Commissions |
Do you have a special person, moment or memory you want to cherish forever? Commission subjects range from landscape viewpoints, homes or architectural buildings, beloved pets and animals, a special portrait or a commemorative wedding portrait, which are ideal as beautiful gifts for any occasion. Please contact Helen with your requirements or please see Commissions Information for more details.
Greeting Cards |
Greetings cards are a great way of sharing joy to friends and family for all occasions such as birthdays or Christmas. However, sometimes it’s enjoyable to send a greetings card for no other reason, than just because! Helen has created a special range of greeting card designs, that reflect the adorable wildlife characters visiting her rural studio (sunning themselves on the studio deck, while she paints). Helen’s greetings cards are also available framed and there are two different framing options available including; off-white and oak.
Pure Watercolour Technique
Helen doesn’t use any white paint in her work, she purely relies on the tone of the paper to be the white in a watercolour painting. Therefore, Helen’s watercolour paintings are carefully considered and composed before any painting begins. Intricate planning takes place before commencing with the watercolour painting, all areas that are to be white are predetermined to be unpainted.
Additionally, to add to the technical difficulties, Helen doesn’t use masking fluid to protect the unpainted areas which is widely used in watercolour painting. She prefers to rely on her steady hand and delicate brushwork skills and consequently, feels this adds a more natural flow to the paintings. Furthermore, there is no black pigment used in any of Helen’s watercolour paintings. For any black or shaded areas, a culmination of layering primary watercolour pigments are used. Essentially, these create a mixed watercolour black but with a wide range of tones which provides more life to the painting.
With Helen’s watercolour paintings, starting with a light sketch, a process of painting from light to dark is used. Tones are built up with colour and this involves a complex progression of building the depth of the watercolour pigment. Helen has a passion for the transparent flow of watercolours, especially where the layers of different watercolour pigments build up to create and combine new hues and luminosity. Find out more about Helen’s watercolour technique and style and you can view a slideshow of how Helen’s images are built and developed.
You can keep up to date with watercolour artist Helen’s work through her regularly updated social media accounts including, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. Alternatively, for any enquiries, please feel free to contact Helen through this form.
