Travel Art Supplies with M. Graham Watercolor Palette

Our sketch group is hosting a group of women artists from Costa Rica this next week and we made them travel art supply kits with a M. Graham watercolor palette. The kit includes a sketchbook with 15 pages of watercolor paper, a glue stick, a water brush, a pen, tissue paper and a palette.
I learned how to make these palettes from Cynthia Mooney. I used 150 grit sandpaper to give tooth to the Altoids tin surfaces.
Then I conditioned some Sculpey clay, put some Sobo glue on the bottom of the tin and then pushed in the clay. The Sculpey clay is heavy. Cynthia says she prefers to make these palettes with paper clay which is much lighter in weight when dried.
I formed wells in the clay with the end of a marker and baked them in my clay dedicated convection oven at 275°F for 20 minutes.
I covered the bottoms of the tins with red suede paper and the tops with garden sketches using the adhesive from my Xyron machine.
Then, I added the M. Graham watercolor paints. These are my favorite travel paints because they do not dry out and go onto paper smooth, with great color. Make yourself a travel art supply kit and enjoy using it on your vacation this summer. You'll remember your travel art as much or more than your photos.

Visit to M Graham and a Watercolor Palette

A visit to M Graham factory reconfirmed our commitment to their watercolor paints. Eight employees work in a converted chicken coop, cinder block building. They mix one or two batches of paint a day and fill about 600 tubes. They make acrylics, oils, gouaches and watercolors as close to 18th and 19th Century paints as possible with natural materials. The use of honey, which they purchase locally, in the watercolors keeps them from drying out and caking. The "Biggies" use corn syrup. Tests show that M Graham colors contain more pigment. They don't have a large marketing budget and have very little overhead. All employees receive health insurance, other benefits and have purchased their own homes. Their philosophy is to make the highest quality paints. They showed us research techniques and color comparisons to other manufactures' paints. It would be incredible to see more small businesses like this one in the US. They sure impressed us.

You can purchase a mini-travel palette from I've Been Framed that is Altoid-size, already has six pans for paints on each side for $9.95. Cynthia Mooney told me in her Art Journal Sketchbook classes about this palette and the M Graham watercolors which work very well in a travel art kit.

Last week, our sketch group met downtown at Powell's Books. I wanted to practice gesture drawing of people. I can see that more practice is in order here.