Matisse Structure Australian Reef Fundamental Set 5x75ml
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Matisse Structure Australian Reef Fundamental Set 5x75ml
Most paintings of the Great Barrier Reef are mostly blue. The reef itself is not. Beneath the surface of the Coral Sea, the dominant colours are the orange-pink of Acropora coral formations, the vivid chartreuse of tropical seagrass, and the chrome yellow of schooling fish lit by filtered Queensland sunlight. The blues are the water column, the frame through which the ecosystem is seen. The living reef is the warm, saturated foreground packed with colour that has no business being this vivid this far from the equator.
The Matisse Structure Australian Reef Fundamental Set addresses both halves of the picture. Australian Sky Blue and Southern Ocean Blue give you the two registers of tropical water: the pale, bleached surface light and the rich, saturated deep water that makes the Great Barrier Reef instantly recognisable. Australian Salmon Gum is the coral-pink that pulls the eye down from the surface and into the reef structure. Australian Yellow Green is the fluorescent seagrass and the vivid green of coral polyps in shallow, sun-drenched water. Yellow Light Hansa, the most transparent yellow in the Matisse Structure range, is the light itself: filtered, warm, and refracting through layers of water onto everything below.
| Colour | Series | Character |
|---|---|---|
| Australian Sky Blue | S2 | Warm, slightly greyed sky blue; surface water and tropical sky |
| Southern Ocean Blue | S2 | Rich, saturated deep tropical blue; the open water column and reef depths |
| Australian Salmon Gum | S2 | Warm salmon-orange-pink; coral formations, tropical fish, reef colour |
| Australian Yellow Green | S3 | Bright warm yellow-green; seagrass, coral polyps, tropical shallows |
| Yellow Light Hansa | S2 | Clean transparent warm yellow; filtered underwater light, tropical fish, coral highlights |
The Great Barrier Reef stretches 2,300 kilometres along the Queensland coast and is, by surface area, the world's largest coral reef system. The visual experience of the reef is stratified by depth. At the surface, the water reads as a pale, bleached blue-green depending on the angle of the sun. A few metres down, the water column deepens to the rich, saturated blue that characterises the open Coral Sea. Closer to the reef structure, warm light filters through the water in shafts, landing on the coral in pools of yellow and gold. The coral itself ranges from orange-pink to deep red; the seagrass beds read as vivid yellow-green; the staghorn and brain coral formations add pale lavender and buff. The five colours in this set address the most visually dominant of these register: the two blues of the water, the pink-orange of coral, the bright green of tropical flora, and the transparent, glowing quality of filtered tropical light.
Southern Ocean Blue + Australian Sky Blue creates the full tonal range of the reef water column, from the pale surface shimmer to the deep saturated blue of the open sea. Vary the ratio to set the depth of your view.
Australian Salmon Gum + Yellow Light Hansa makes a vivid warm coral-orange that captures the sunlit face of Acropora and branching coral formations. Use this at full strength for foreground coral structures in direct light.
Southern Ocean Blue + Australian Yellow Green gives the deep, shadowed green of reef structure below the bright surface zone. This mix reads as a rich teal-green, and is the key shadow colour for seagrass beds and coral overhangs.
Australian Yellow Green + Yellow Light Hansa makes an almost fluorescent lime that captures the shallow tropical seagrass beds and the vivid green of coral polyp tentacles when light hits them directly from above.
Australian Salmon Gum + Southern Ocean Blue creates a muted, cool mauve-grey that is the shadow side of coral formations, the darker undersides of reef structure, and the receding colour of coral as it moves deeper into the water column.
- Heavy body impasto consistency that holds bold palette knife texture for impasto coral formations and reef structure
- High pigment concentration delivering the intense, high-chroma colour saturation that reef subjects demand
- Yellow Light Hansa is highly transparent in the Matisse Structure Formula range, making it especially effective for layered glazing over dried colour to replicate underwater light effects
- Excellent lightfastness ratings on all five colours in this set
- Compatible with MM4 Gel Medium for extending the transparency and flow of Yellow Light Hansa when creating thin, luminous glazes over dried layers
- Made in Australia by Derivan, Chipping Norton NSW, since the 1960s
Matisse Structure Formula is Australia's definitive heavy-body acrylic paint, produced by Derivan at their Sydney facility in Chipping Norton. Derivan has been manufacturing professional artist colours in Australia since the 1960s, making them the country's longest-running domestic art paint producer. The Structure Formula range spans over 100 colours, including the Australian Series, developed specifically to represent the palette of the Australian environment. Matisse Structure is favoured by Australian artists for its high pigment density, impasto body, reliable batch consistency, and exceptional lightfastness.
How is the Australian Reef Fundamental Set different from the Matisse Structure Seascape Set?
The Matisse Structure Seascape Set is a 10-piece collection (eight colours and two mediums) designed around the full range of Australian coastal water colour, with four blues for different moods of the sea. It is a surface-water, above-the-waterline palette. The Australian Reef Fundamental Set is built for the reef ecosystem, not the sea surface. It includes only two blues, and the remaining three colours are the warm, vivid tones of reef life: coral in Salmon Gum, seagrass and polyps in Yellow Green, and filtered tropical light in Yellow Light Hansa. Artists who want to paint reef life below the surface will find the Reef Fundamental Set more useful; artists who want to paint the Australian coast, bays, and open sea will find the Seascape Set more comprehensive. Many artists who paint marine subjects own both.
Can I paint a convincing Great Barrier Reef scene with only these five colours?
Yes, with a few caveats. The five colours in this set cover the dominant visual zones of a reef painting: water surface, deep water, coral, seagrass, and filtered light. Mixes within the set extend the palette significantly. Southern Ocean Blue and Australian Yellow Green mix to a rich reef teal. Salmon Gum and Southern Ocean Blue mix to a cool coral shadow. Yellow Light Hansa glazed over dried blues creates the underwater light effect. What the set does not include is a white for lightening and a neutral for mixing greys, so some artists add Titanium White from their existing stock. The palette is also intentionally vivid and high-chroma, which is appropriate for the Great Barrier Reef in full sunlight but would need to be tempered for overcast or deep-water conditions. For those subjects, Matisse Structure individual tubes of Titanium White and Raw Umber are natural additions.
What is Yellow Light Hansa and why is it in a reef palette?
Yellow Light Hansa is one of the most transparent yellows available in professional acrylic painting. It is based on Arylide Yellow pigment (PY3), known for its clean, bright, warm-leaning yellow hue and high degree of transparency. In the context of the reef palette, it serves two roles. First, it is the body colour of tropical fish such as angelfish, parrotfish, and the bright yellow wrasse species that are visually iconic in Great Barrier Reef imagery. Second, and more important technically, its transparency makes it an ideal glazing colour. Applied as a thin wash over dried blues and greens, Yellow Light Hansa shifts those colours toward the warm, golden-green that tropical water takes on when lit by the Queensland sun from above. No other colour in the standard palette achieves this warm underwater luminosity as effectively. It is the light source of the palette.
What painting techniques work best for capturing underwater reef effects with impasto acrylic?
Several techniques translate well to reef subjects using Matisse Structure Formula. Layered glazing is the most important: build up the reef structure in opaque layers of Salmon Gum, Yellow Green, and the two blues, allow each layer to dry fully, then apply transparent washes of Yellow Light Hansa diluted with MM4 Gel Medium to create the warm, diffused light of the underwater environment. Impasto palette knife work is effective for the textural surface of coral formations: load Salmon Gum or Salmon Gum mixed with Yellow Light Hansa onto the knife and stroke across the canvas to create the raised, rough texture of Acropora coral. For the water itself, soft horizontal strokes of Australian Sky Blue mixed into Southern Ocean Blue read convincingly as the gently moving surface plane. Wet-into-wet blending at the reef edge, where water meets coral, creates the soft halo of light and refraction that makes reef paintings feel alive.
What is a Matisse Structure Fundamental Set and does it include mediums?
Matisse Structure Fundamental Sets are curated five-colour collections of 75ml tubes, each chosen to address a specific subject, landscape, or colour theme. Unlike the Matisse Structure Classic Sets, which contain eight colours plus two mediums (MM2 Impasto Medium and MM4 Gel Medium) for a total of ten pieces, Fundamental Sets contain paint only. No mediums are included. This makes them a focused, paint-first experience for artists who already own Matisse mediums or who prefer to start with pure colour. For reef subjects in particular, MM4 Gel Medium is a useful companion to thin the Yellow Light Hansa into an effective glazing medium. Both MM2 and MM4 are available separately at Art Shed Online and are fully compatible with all Matisse Structure Formula paints.
(1PMSFU05ARE)
| SKU | 1PMSFU05ARE |
| Barcode # | 9310097008959 |
| Brand | Matisse |
| Shipping Weight | 0.6550kg |
| Shipping Width | 0.190m |
| Shipping Height | 0.040m |
| Shipping Length | 0.200m |
| Shipping Cubic | 0.001520000m3 |
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