I’m in love with gouache paints!
The color is so rich and so deep that I often have to shade my eyes when I’m painting. The brightness evokes the gem-like quality of stained glass windows when the sun streams through them; deep sunsets, brilliant red dresses and cherries fresh from the tree.
I also like not worrying about shading or depth perception – most of the paintings I do in this medium are very bold, consisting of unshaded areas of staggering color.
“…Also referred to as bodycolor and opaque watercolor, the term “gouaches” was first used during the eighteenth century in France to describe the use of a translucent water-based paint that had been rendered opaque by the addition of white pigment or chalk bound together with a binding agent such as gum arabic.
Contrary to watercolor’s key characteristic of transparent luminosity, gouache is defined by its matte and opaque quality.
Today’s commercially available product known as gouache differs considerably from that used by earlier draftsmen. It is smooth, thick, satiny, and especially opaque. It can be used thinned with water to create a watercolor effect.
(A couple of good examples of past artists' use of the medium are Louis-Gabriel Moreau's Parc de Saint-Cloud; and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec's, Trapeze at the Medrano Circus).
(info thanks to artmuseums.harvard.edu/sargentatharvard/drawingglossary.html)