Zoltan Szabo (1928-2003) was an evocative landscape watercolorist, prolific workshop instructor, and author of dozens of books. Today, I’ll be looking at his 1998 book Zoltan Szabo’s Color-by-Color Guide to Watercolor.
This is basically a coffee table book with spreads for various selected colors, showing a painting that features that color and providing some information such as characteristics and alternatives. I can see how this book might have been useful in a pre-Handprint world, though it’s now out-of-date, not to mention lacking in hard facts (it contains no pigment numbers, for instance). Some of the information is suspect, and much of the text feels like filler. Still, it’s a beautifully-designed book with gorgeous pictures and sumptuous color. My partner saw me reading this and called it my equivalent of a soft baby book: just a nice sensory experience.
My favorite thing about the book is the paintings: Szabo shows a reference photo and then a painting made from it, at several stages, and each time the reference photo is quite different, especially in terms of color. It’s pretty inspirational since changing the reference photo is a journey I’m currently working on.
The Palette
He begins the book right off by sharing his own palette, which he divides into “My Palette” and “My Fun Palette.”
Zoltan Szabo’s Palette
Szabo describes these colors as “steady, dependable and predictable” (p. 11). Szabo does provide the brands of his colors. I’ve provided the pigment numbers I could find, though many of them may have been different in 1998. The “basic” palette has a generous 16 colors.
| ZS Had | Slot |
| MaimeriBlu – Permanent Yellow Lemon (PY175) | Lemon Yellow |
| Winsor & Newton – Winsor Yellow Deep (PY65) | Warm Yellow |
| Blockx – Cadmium Red Orange (PR108) | Scarlet |
| Winsor & Newton – Quinacridone Red (PR209) | Red |
| Rembrandt – Quinacridone Rose (PV19) | Magenta |
| Blockx – Cobalt Violet (PV14) | Violet |
| MaimeriBlu – Permanent Violet Bluish (PV23) | Violet |
| Winsor & Newton – French Ultramarine (PB29) | Violet-Blue |
| Blockx – Manganese Blue (PB33) | Cyan |
| Rembrandt – Bluish Green (PG7) | Green |
| Holbein – Cadmium Green (PG18, PY35) | Yellow-Green |
| Blockx – Gold Ochre (PBr7) | Earth Yellow |
| MaimeriBlu – Raw Sienna (PBr7) | Earth Orange-Yellow |
| MaimeriBlu – Burnt Sienna (PBr7) | Earth Orange |
| Winsor & Newton – Brown Madder (PR206) | Earth Red |
| MaimeriBlu – Ivory Black (PBk9) | Black |
Zoltan Szabo’s Fun Palette
These colors “create a surprise effect in my paintings whenever I feel like challenging myself” (p. 11). The fun colors represent a second set of 16 colors, for a total of 32 in both palettes.
| ZS Had | Slot |
| MaimeriBlu – Permanent Green Yellowish (PY97, PG36) | Lemon Yellow (from Jane Blundell’s website, this looks more like a yellow than a green) |
| Blockx – Gamboge Yellow (PY65) | Warm Yellow |
| Holbein – Scarlet Lake (PO73, PV19, PR254) | Scarlet |
| Winsor & Newton – Permanent Carmine (PR176) | Cool Red |
| Blockx – Magenta (PV19 beta) | Magenta |
| MaimeriBlu – Garnet Lake (PR88) | Violet |
| Winsor & Newton – Ultramarine Violet (PV15) | Violet |
| Blockx – Cyanine Blue (PB28, PB15:1) | Blue |
| Daniel Smith – Cobalt Teal Blue (PG50) | Turquoise |
| Holbein – Cobalt Green (PB28, PW6, PG18) | Green |
| Rembrandt – Viridian Green (PG18) | Green |
| Blockx – Emerald Green (PG18) | Green |
| Blockx – Blockx Green (PG7) | Green |
| Winsor & Newton – Green Gold (PY129) | Gold |
| Rembrandt – Naples Yellow Deep (PBr24, PY53, PW6) | Earth Yellow |
| MaimeriBlu – Dragon’s Blood (PBr25) | Brown |
My Thoughts
I love the idea of having a main and “fun” palette. I have a lot of colors I would consider “fun!” I also love the thought that you should have as many fun colors as useful colors.
The swatches make both of these palettes look extremely bold and beautiful. Every time I see someone’s palette I want it, even though, the more I look into this one, the weirder it gets.
It feels to me like there’s a lot of repetition here! For example, Winsor Yellow Deep and Blockx Gamboge are (currently, at least) the same pigment, and appear to be the same hue from the book’s swatches. Ditto Rembrandt Viridian Green and Blockx Emerald Green. I like to think that I would use 32 slots in a more varied way, but the truth is that I’ve put together a pretty similarly-sized collection recently and it did have what other people would probably consider repetition (e.g. both Quin Rose and Quin Magenta; several kinds of earth yellow). To me the distinctions matter! I suppose it’s the same way for Zoltan.
I have the Maimeri yellow green and it’s definitely yellow — I’d say it’s very similar to the way my palette yellow usually paints out, what with all the blue contamination… But you could maybe consider duping it with Holbein leaf green? It’s PY154 PG7, and a touch greener (I have a sample of it) but I think it’s very similar in spirit.
I would also like to add that I could live with that main palette! I could definitely live with it, even if I’d like more blues and an azo yellow. (Well, I’d also prefer less Blockx, obviously.)