MASA PAINTING - PREPARING THE PAPER

INSTRUCTIONS FOR USING & MOUNTING MASA PAPER

Masa paper is a type of machine-made Japanese art paper made from sulphite pulp. It is soft and white, has internal and surface sizing, and is archival. Masa can be used for a wide range of art techniques, including sumi painting, watercolor, and printmaking. One side is smoother and shinier than the other.

Masa paper is also very inexpensive, compared to the cost of regular watercolor paper. It does, however, need to be mounted on watercolor paper. So this is where your CHEAP watercolor paper comes in handy.

Using masa paper became popular when famous watercolor artist Cheng-Khee Chee (I always think

“Chunky Cheese”)  used it widely. You can find many examples of his art work on line or in his book.

Try Google-ing “masa paper” and you will find some beautiful artwork done by others as well. There

are even a few you-tubes out there on the subject.

Different teachers teach this painting technique several ways. We are going to do it the easiest way

I have found.

1.      FIRST, make a small X in a corner in pen on the SHINY side of the paper. You will not paint on this side.

2.      SECOND: This is the fun part. Wad the paper up and crinkle it until you have the effect you want. (this breaks the sizing in the paper, so when you paint on it you get a textured effect.)

3.      THIRD: dip the paper in clean water to soak it thoroughly.

4.      FOURTH: Spread the paper on some paper towels on your board.

5.      FIFTH: On the side without the X, make washes of clean color over your paper. Be sure to leave some white spots. You do not have to cover all the paper. You can plan a little bit here: put cool colors in shadow areas, warm colors where you want some warms. Don’t over-think this. Have fun with it. Your wash may look dark, but it will dry much lighter.

What masa looks like after step 5.

NOTE: Because the masa paper is so wet, it is fragile at this time, so be gentle with it or it will tear. If it does get a tear, don’t despair! When you glue it down, the tear will not show, but look like part of the crinkle texture. (Not you can see a tear in this picture at the top, but in the picture of it glued down, the tear is not noticeable.)

6.      SIXTH: Dry completely. You can set it over a fan to speed the drying, but the fan will leave

some of its own marks on the paper.

AT THIS POINT, YOU CAN DRAW ON YOUR PAPER AND CONTINUE TO CAREFULLY PAINT ON IT AND THEN MOUNT IT, OR YOU CAN MOUNT IT FIRST. PAINTING ON IT WITHOUT MOUNTING CREATES MORE INTERESTING EFFECTS, BUT THE PAPER BECOMES MORE FRAGILE. CHOOSE WHICH WAY YOU LIKE!

7.      MOUNT THE DRIED PAINTING on some cheap watercolor paper. Now is the time to use up some of that cheap stuff you bought before you knew better. (NOTE: You can also mount masa paper on canvas!)

a.      Make a mixture of 2 parts mat medium or white glue to 1 part water.

NOTE THIS IS MAT MEDIUM, not gloss. Gloss will not accept paint very well.

b.      Using a large old brush, spread the glue onto the watercolor paper, just slightly bigger than the masa paper.

c.      Place your painting over the glued paper and press down.

d.      Put some wax paper over the masa painting and using a brayer or other pressure, roll over all of it to seal to the wc paper. (The wax paper is there to keep from getting glue and wet paint all over your hands and materials….the glue tends to make the paint bleed a little bit.)

e.      Air dry until you no longer feel glue around the edges.

f.       Press the painting between two boards lined with butcher or wax paper and weigh down until completely dry.

8.      DRAW on your sketch using either a light box or graphite paper (Saral). I don’t sketch directly onto it because I don’t want erasures on the masa paper.

9.      PAINT using whatever method works for your painting.

In this painting, I've begun by washing over the red strawberries with two shades of reds, 

letting them run together, and being careful to leave the stems and leaves alone. When that dried, I painted the dark areas by negative painting the shadows behind the strawberries with a mix of red and adding some blue. At this point, they are just beginning to look rounded, and the paint is still transparent looking.

The leaves were washed over with yellow, dropping in a little blue to make the green color. Again, this was done keeping the paint trasparent looking, not thick. I darkened the shadows between the leaves with blue. I put a light wash of green over the stems and buds.  Then I added a slightly darker

green to the lines in the leaves, leaving one edge hard and softeneing the other edge with water.

This painting is not finished. More on it after next class.