A little gift I received this summer was more fun than I could have imagined. It also awakened a new passion, that I want to share with you: miniature watercolor paintings!
Chapters
The cover of the tiny zine full of watercolors and the palette I used to paint it.
A Little Gift For Big Inspirations
A friend gifted me a tiny travel palette with watercolors. The palette itself is so small with a tiny brush and only quarter pans filled with paint. The amount of colors is pretty big though. This tiny set lead to a burst of creativity for me. First I painted two miniature watercolors. And as it wasn’t enough, I made a miniature zine to fill like a sketchbook with more landscape paintings. It took me only a few days to fill it completely, because I just couldn’t stop.
First 8 pages of the zine. Each is just about as big as a stamp.
The Zine
Zines are kind of sketchbooks or short comics, which are folded in a very simple way and do not require binding at all. They can be painted on one side or, like in my case, on both sides of the sheet. For my tiny one, I used only one A5 piece of watercolor paper. Of course 100% cotton one.
On the back are two pages, which open horizontally, that gave me space to paint landscapes in a different direction.
Two hidden pages on the back of the zine give space for horizontal paintings.
The Inspiration
While painting I have been inspired by different landscapes and settings, imagining how it would be to go on adventures in those areas.
It was wonderful to get lost in these miniatures and to paint them with as much detail and passion as I do in bigger paintings too. The brushes I used were just as tiny as the rest of the equipment. So I painted very carefully using only the very tip to get the details down.
The paintings on the back of the zine including the back cover.
The Postage Stamp Size
I must admit, that I had the most fun painting in the size of a simple postage stamp. Now I wish, that one day I’d get the chance to paint for an actual stamp.
(If someone actually wants to [commission (/commissions/)me to design a stamp, I'm all game for it!)
One last photo I have for you, so you get the feeling how small the zine actually is. In this one you can see the paintings in relation to my thumb. And no… I’m not a giant!
Miniature sketchbook in relation to my hand.
The tiny palette and sketchbook were just what I needed to relax. I painted small and spontaneous, without pre-sketching.
In case you feel inspired, feel free to make a tiny sketchbook too and paint whatever you are in the mood for! The tiny zine has only a limited amount of pages and is filled rather quickly. You can make it into a series of miniature paintings of whatever you feel like. Landscapes? Ghosties? Cats? Everything is possible!
Feel free to share it with me and the community on discord or tag me on Mastodon/Pixelfed.
Have a wonderful and creative day!
Lana