Paints I Hate: Phthalo Green

I used to claim that if I ever started a watercolour blog, I would call it Paints I Hate, by the Negative Painter.

Well, I finally have a chance to fulfill my claims! And I will start with the first paint I have ever hated: Phthalo Green. Luckily for me, Logan has already covered all the facts about both PG7 and its marginally less hate-worthy cousin PG36, leaving me free to focus on my emotions.

My Emotional Journey

I did not always hate these pigments. When I tried my first “viridian hue” (a common name for PG7) I loved the rich emerald shade. Because it is gorgeous.

My intense crush on this paint faded when I realized that:

1. The paint is seriously staining, and it seems to get EVERYWHERE. Not just into my pale paintbrushes and cheaper palettes and yellow paint pans, but also on my clothes and limbs.
2. Nothing in nature is actually as bright as this colour in its pure form. Or as blue-leaning.
3. And yes, you can modify the phthalo into almost any shade of green you desire, but this pigment is so high-tinting that you have to be very, very careful about the mix ratios, especially if (like me) you tend to carry a lot of medium-tinting paints.
4. Phthalo green does not even bring any interesting texture to the table. (Unlike Viridian, or the many green cobalts.)

And yet, and yet…

1. Washing is a thing. (I find that olive oil cleans up my palettes nicely.) And staining is very useful when trying to layer, since it means your beautiful first layers won’t turn scabby and lift. (I am looking at YOU, cobalts.)
2. It is not like I have taken a vow to paint all the colours I see accurately. Also… it is not even true that extremely bright greens never occur in nature. I am not even talking about birds/snakes/butterflies or toxic waste pools: sunlit foliage does contain patches of extremely saturated colour. And then there’s water, which can display all kinds of interesting hues.
3. High-tinting colours are awesome because they get used up very slowly, so there is little danger of running out of them halfway through a trip. (I am looking at YOU, cobalts.) Also, phthalo green is additionally a cheap pigment, especially the PG7 version!  
4. Not everything needs to be textured. Anyway, many of the granulating greens struggle to get dark, while both the green phthalos make convincing darks: greens, obviously, but also violets and neutrals. (A couple of brands sell a black made out of PG7 and PB264, but many middle reds will work.) And even if the phthalos are not textured themselves, they can form a basis for textured, separating mixtures, when mixed with a granulating paint. I know Logan has mentioned this, but I think it is worth highlighting. Just look:

(Incidentally, I am aware that i am all-but-ignoring PG36. This is because I see PG36 is basically “PG7 minus” in pretty much every way. It is less obnoxious, less blue, less unnatural… and less cheap.)

Some Example Paintings Featuring PG7

So, anyway, yes, I do use this hateful paint. For this entry, I decided to use it TWICE! I also chose to do some minor negative painting, to live up to the nickname I am trying to establish here.

This first painting is meant as a demonstration of PG7’s dark mixing power. All the darks are just PG7 and PR209; there’s also a small amount of PY151 in the leaves, but otherwise this is a two-colour painting.

This second painting was meant to showcase that sometimes the brightness of PG7 is very very useful, at least to me, since I know the original foliage was eye-stabbingly vibrant. (A PB16 or PB15 would have gotten me some of the way there, but not quite all the way.) Also, I used no blue in this painting, just PG7, PV37, PY151 and a couple of earths. Oh, and I did the leaves in layers. If I had swapped the PG7 for Viridian or PG26, I would have had a lift-tastic disaster on my hands.

The Conclusion

PG7 is a horrible paint and nobody should use it, unless they want to paint vibrant layered greens, or use a limited palette with no blue and/or black, or get some specific cool textures, or save money, or understand what I am talking about here in this post.