Description

A Handmade Palette: Natural and Historical Watercolors

With Natalie Stopka

July 10-13, 2025 

Botanical Colors HQ

Where does color come from? It’s a story of rocks and minerals, plants and insects, and artisan ingenuity in the service of chronic chromophilia! In this workshop we’ll delve into the history, chemistry, and hands-on practice of pigments and paint-making. Together we’ll concoct a palette of 12 handmade watercolors for participants to take home in a trusty travel paintbox.

These are inspired by pre-industrial artists’ recipes from the 14-17th century. Much of our focus will be on the glorious shades of botanical colors: lake pigments and Maya blue made from scratch. We’ll also process earth pigments and charcoal, before mixing natural paint medium and mulling our pigments into paints. Along the way, we’ll also mull over the socio-cultural and ecological entanglements of color, with stories from the artist’s studio, monastic scriptorium, and alchemist’s laboratory. Participants will leave with a paintbox of 12 watercolors, a sketchbook of recipes and swatches, and the knowledge to continue expanding their palette with thoughtfully foraged and homemade pigments. Every shade in our paintbox tells a story through its rich, characterful, handmade color.

Outcomes

• How to extract, precipitate, and wash lake pigments
• Historically-inspired recipes for 5 different lake pigments, sap green & Maya blue
• How to make natural watercolor medium
• Making watercolors: pigment grinding & paint mulling
• Best practices for lightfastness
• Riveting true tales from the history of art and chemistry!

Our Teacher: Natalie Stopka (she/her) is a Yonkers, New York based artist and educator focused on the material history of color and sustainable studio practice. Her collaborative, experimental printmaking captures the material and elemental interactions of botanical dyes and foraged pigments. These root her artwork to place with a seasonally evolving vocabulary of texture and color. Natalie holds a BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design and MFA from the University of New Mexico, Albuquerque.

www.nataliestopka.com