Hi friends! It’s been a long time. I played with Marie’s Masters Watercolour before writing this review, which is the longest I have taken. There are reasons which I will get into.
I bought this set on Amazon, sold by Jerry’s Artarama from the US. After shipping and taxes, this set of 18 came to CAD$57.44, which is $3.19 per tube of 9ml. It is a fantastic price for what it claims to be–a professional level watercolour. I bought this because Lindsay Weirich said the Masters version reminded her of Winsor & Newton’s professional line. And we know how much W&N’s professional paints cost! So I bought Marie’s Masters Watercolour with fairly high hopes.
Product Specs and Swatches:
There are 43 colours in total. I bought the 18 set, and each tube contains 9ml or 0.31 fl. oz. of paint. In case you are wondering, the company listed is not the same as the manufacturer of Paul Rubens.
Here are the swatches:
The swatches did not look the best, but I have some observations to add. I don’t know how long this set had been sitting on the shelf, or maybe that’s just the way these are made. When I opened each tube, a significant amount of thick, almost transparent liquid came out first, which I presumed to be separation of paint from the binders or arabic gum. I have had Van Gogh watercolour for many years and even reopening them recently they did not ooze liquid like this. Is this preservative? I don’t know.
Every single tube. Some had a lot more than others. I began to worry because if the binders separated from the paint, would that affect the paint sticking to the paper? Would it affect the performance of the paint? If you know more about this, please let me know in the comments.
Anyway, I did these swatches when I first opened the tubes, and I don’t know if they would have been better any other way.
Due to the potential separation of binders and the paints, I decided to use Marie’s Masters Watercolour on different papers. I want to see whether they will stick to the paper, especially if I glaze.
Testing on Lightwish 100% Cotton Paper
I used Lightwish Watercolour Sketchbook for the very first painting. In fact, I struggled to build the colours, but it was something I noticed about Lightwish watercolour paper which could explain it. I find its sizing to be a bit too much, so the paints tend to lift very easily even if they already dried. I tried painting on the Lightwish Watercolour Journal next, with slightly better results, but perhaps it’s due to me not layering too much.
Testing on Other 100% Cotton Watercolour Papers (cold pressed)
By now, I am pretty sure it was the paper, not the paint, that caused the lifting. To confirm my suspicion, I painted on several other 100% cold pressed cotton papers from different brands. I didn’t have any trouble glazing, and the paints didn’t lift easily once semi-dried or dried. However, I did notice that some of the paints granulate.
I don’t know if the potential separation of the binders from the paints could have caused this or some shades just naturally granulate (e.g. ultramarine). This could be a pro if you like granulating paints. The granulation isn’t pronounced, so I did not mind it. But it is something of note, since the Chinese description claimed the paints are transparent and smooth.
By the way, the white in the painting above is Dr. Ph. Martin’s Bleedproof White. The white that comes with the Marie’s set is not opaque.
I did not have any trouble layering, especially the sunset colours above, to get the maximum vibrancy I wanted to achieve. So thankfully, the paints performed very well.
Finally, I tested Marie’s Masters Watercolour on the gold standard of all watercolour paper: Arches. The paints performed well and I had no trouble with glazing.
Summary of Marie’s Masters Watercolour Review
Marie’s Masters Watercolour performed very well, with a few paints that granulated. However, I cannot be sure whether the binders separated from the paints, which could have caused the granulation. The paints are generally smooth and easy to rewet.
As with any watercolour sets, though, I resent having a white shade. This one is useless in my opinion; it is not opaque enough to be like Bleedproof White, and it only makes a shade cloudy if you mix them together. I wish they had included an indigo or phthalo blue instead of the white, but it seems pretty standard for most of these sets to give us a useless shade anyway. 😛
If I had to compare Marie’s Masters Watercolour to another Chinese brand, I still prefer Paul Rubens. But Marie’s Masters is still very good. At this price I really cannot complain.
This concludes my Marie’s Masters Watercolour Review. By the way, Marie’s has a much cheaper version, which Lindsay Weirich said was not good. So if you purchase Marie’s, make sure it’s the Masters version!
