What’s in my palette? (April 2024)

I’ve already shared different palettes in January and February of this year, but this time I’m serious! (I think.) I’m reducing my tube collection, not just what’s dry on my palette, because I am moving cross-continent next month and trying to get down to a “suitcases” level of stuff! That’s right, you heard it here first folks: after spending the last year touring various Canadian cities to find my favourite, I am officially moving to Vancouver.

So which paints are making the cut to come with me?

My Top 28

I have a Tableau de Couleur fabric pouch and I decided I can only take the number of tubes that fit in the pouch, which is 28. 28 divides nicely into two 14-color Pocket Palettes.

One of my Pocket Palettes contains my Spring Palette.

I went over the spring palette in my Plein Airpril Week 1 update, so I’ll only recount the other Pocket Palette, which is “everything else.” This isn’t necessarily a palette I would design for independent use; it lacks some of the color categories that the Spring Palette is strong in (like most of the blues), and is overly heavy on colors that I happen to struggle to choose between (yellows & warm reds).

Top Row:

1. Holbein – Imidazolone Yellow PY154
2. Da Vinci – Permanent Red PR188
3. Da Vinci – Perylene Red PR149
4. Daniel Smith – Quin Red PV19
5. Daniel Smith – Carbazole Violet PV23
6. Holbein – Phthalo Blue Red Shade PB15
7. Holbein – Payne’s Gray

Bottom Row:

• Mission Gold – Green Gold PY150
• Winsor & Newton – Naples Yellow Deep PBr24
• Winsor & Newton – Gold Ochre PY42
• Daniel Smith – Quinacridone Burnt Orange PO48
• Winsor & Newton – Venetian Red PR101
• Da Vinci – Ultramarine Blue PB29
• Winsor & Newton – Perylene Green PBk31

These basically fall into a few categories:

• All-stars that just didn’t happen to work in my spring palette: Imidazolone Yellow, Quin Red, Phthalo Blue Red Shade.
• Colors for Vancouver! Perylene Green, Quin Burnt Orange, and Carbazole Violet were all-stars in my Vancouver Palette last fall. I’m not entirely sure if that was because they are truly great for Vancouver or confirmation bias (I expected them to be good there so they were), but it seems weird to cut them before I move to the place where I loved them.
• Specialist colors optimized for another specific season or situation: PBr24 for sunsets, Gold Ochre for fall, Permanent Red and Nickel Azo Yellow for summer, Payne’s Gray for painting birds.
• Recent fads: Perylene Red (a new Da Vinci color), Venetian Red (an all-star of the Blues & Browns Palette).
• Colors that feel important: Ultramarine Blue is so ubiquitous in other people’s palettes that I’m not ready to let go of it even though I don’t usually like it as much as Cobalt Blue or Indanthrone Blue (depending on the situation).

A secret third thing

Because I always have to have my little secrets, I have filled a third Pocket Palette with colors whose tubes I gave away. So these are colors that I still have, but only as pans. Again, this isn’t a cohesive palette at all, just a collection of (mostly repetitive) extra colors that I wasn’t quite ready to fully part with (though amusingly I think it looks kind of like a desert palette).

Top Row:

• DS Hansa Yellow Deep PY65 (very similar to PY110 in the Spring Palette. Am I being silly by choosing PY110 because it’s the one I got more recently? maybe????)
• WN Transparent Pyrrol Orange
• DS Deep Scarlet PR175 (similar to Perylene Red)
• Holbein Quin Violet PV19
• Holbein Phthalo Blue GS (similar to Ultramarine, it’s a color I’ve held onto because it’s ubiquitous, but I prefer PB16 or PBRS)
• Holbein Indigo
• DS Indigo (two kinds of indigo!! I like them but don’t find them that useful – esp not with Payne’s Gray, Indanthrone, PBRS, and Perylene Green in my main palettes)

Bottom Row:

• Holbein Yellow Ochre PY42
• DS MANS PBr7 (a color I have praised for years!! only Holbein RS in my spring palette is super similar)
• DV Raw Sienna PBr7 (I prefer a yellower shade)
• DV Burnt Sienna Deep PR101 (too similar to TRO and QBO)
• DV Indian Red PR101 (a surprising drop, since it’s one of the colors that I consider basics, but I just don’t use it much & liked Venetian Red better in the Blues & Browns challenge)
• WN Caput Mortuum Violet PR101
• Holbein Titanium White PW6

These are colors I am basically cutting. While I retained these pans a mementos, the tubes have been passed on to friends and newbies, so I can’t refill them when I run through the pan (unless I buy more paint).

No Paint Buy Update

Speaking of which, how’s my No Paint Buy year coming, you ask? Answer: Bad! Five of the paints above are ones that I bought this year (WN Caput Mortuum Violet, Holbein Raw Sienna, DS Indigo, DS Phthalo Green YS, Rembrandt Lavender). I most forgive the Indigo and PGYS purchases, as these were 5mls that I bought in person at a real art store while visiting Toronto, and I like being able to spend a bit of money on the rare occasions that I’m at an independent art store. Based on these feelings, I’m amending my No Paint Buy Year rules as follows: No buying paint online or at big box stores, but it’s okay to patronize an in-person, independent art store.

This is a dangerous precedent to set, as the summer sublet I’m moving into will be a 10 minute walk from an in person art supply store. Mwahahaha.