To create exceptional washes, the Lefranc Bourgeois fine watercolour collection offers 3 boxes of 12, 24 or 40 half-packs. The shades have been carefully selected for their properties - they have a beautiful transparency and an excellent tinting strength to meet the needs of all artists.

To create exceptional washes, the Lefranc Bourgeois fine watercolour collection offers 3 boxes of 12, 24 or 40 half-packs. The shades have been carefully selected for their properties - they have a beautiful transparency and an excellent tinting strength to meet the needs of all artists.

Watercolour is a paint composed of ground pigments and gummed water, appreciated for its transparency and luminosity.

The birth of watercolour dates back to the Middle Ages, although it has been known since Egyptian times. It reached its peak during the Renaissance as an art form. Watercolour is defined as water paint on paper. The gum arabic that is contained in the paints will bind the pigments together, leaving the watercolour transparent and luminous on the support.

The amount of pigments in the paint will allow the intensity of the colour to be played with once it is mixed with water.

"I could never live far from the sea", James MacKeown.

This sentence is the title of his book published by Les Falaises.

James MacKeown is an Irish painter. He came to France 30 years ago, to Brittany, and settled in Paimpol where he opened his own art gallery. In his paintings, James MacKeown reproduces the liveliness of the water and captures the joy of life of his family, his source of inspiration, having fun by the sea. His luminous works plunge us into the heart of these simple and essential moments of emotion.

With Lefranc Bourgeois watercolour James intensifies this moment and the pigment linked to the water pays tribute to this soft and poetic moment.

"Watercolour is a wonderful mirror of nature", Ewa Karpinska

Born in Poland in 1962, Ewa Karpinska graduated in landscape architecture at the University of Life Sciences in Warsaw. She participated in the revival of watercolour in France with several publications reinventing the use of watercolour. With water at the centre of her practice, she captures in her works organic forms reminiscent of the movement of life. She accompanies us in a series of tutorials, available on our website, to learn all about the basics of watercolour painting. The programme of this mini-series covers the different techniques using watercolour through the themes of nature, portraiture, the sky, water and still life.

Ewa has tested and approved the Lefranc Bourgeois watercolour collection.