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Dupont instructor, Caroline Marsland gave a demo on painting snow on Dec 13/17. She used acrylic paint mixed in big batches of colours and started with a quick sketch. She informed us that snow was painted cool the foreground and warmer in the background. It works dark to light. Very often tracks in the snow lead your eye into the picture. Snow reflects all the colours around it. Watch out using grey as it kills the picture. Colour makes snow look bright, especially cad orange , yellows and pinks. Cobalt blue gives a clean look. Different whites can be used for buildings. Build up your painting and check tonal values.  

This demonstration was most helpful for those of us wanting to paint animals and birds. Caroline started by introducing us to painting short feathers, as those on the owl below: Mix three shades: dark, medium and light of the colours of the feathers. Start with the dark shapes , loosely and with little strokes. Use the medium brown and build up layers, putting on blocks of colour. Use the white of the paper for the lightest part of the feathers Put in the lighter shades, pulling in colours using the side of a flat brush with little flicks, allowing dark colours underneath to create depth.   For longer feathers, as in the tail feathers of the hen draw out the outlines first, then put in the dark areas. Fill in the shadows using the medium shade.    When brushing long feathers, start at the quill and work outwards. Fur For fur use dark tones first and follow the direction of the fur. Use a rigger for finer points. Think about the highlights, which go on last Use a dryish “damaged “ * brush with unwatery paint for the wispy fur ends.. Using a mid- grey rather than white, build up the light areas. A useful trick is to use a flat brush with a different colour on each side *Any old flat brush will be suitable. Just snip it irregularly with nail scissors until it is nice and spikey!

Today Caroline presented a selection of mediums: Pencils, both lead and coloured, charcoal, watercolours, acrylics and pastels, along with her personal recommendations as to brands. Pencils Caroline favours 8B for drawing, as it is possible to get a really dark tone with it. HB she finds too hard and light, but these can be used for watercolour sketch-ins. Recommended brands are Faber Castel and Staedtler. Coloured Pencils The cheaper ones need more pressure.  Caroline suggests that we press hard and add layers before adding water and blending. Best quality are Derwent, followed by Faber Castel and Caran d’ache. Charcoal Avoid Coates. There are different sizes in Winsor and Newton’s range. Some is reconstituted. Derwent charcoal pencils are good for fine lines. Can produce a very dark line too. Watercolours The Russian brand – White Knight are very sticky, but have lots of pigment. They are now available from Jackson Art, and can be bought individually. Daler Rowney need a lot of rubbing. A good indicator is that if the paper shows through, the paint is cheap, as with Pelican, which has very feeble colours. Acrylics Golden and Liquitex are the recommended brands as System 3 student quality has some poor colours, particularly the yellows. Winsor & Newton Galleria come under the same banner. Gel mediums can be used with acrylics: mix with acrylic to bulk up paint, but be aware that this will dilute the pigment. Also available are crackle textures. You can make your own gesso with talcum powder +PVA+water. Pastels WH Smith have a good colour range. Schmincke are very soft, for those who like this effect.. Pan pastels can be used with a sponge for smudge work. Sennelier are a favoured make. Faber Castel makes a range of pencil pastels. Caroline said that it is best to...

  The use of  glazes over a black and white portrait painting  gives a different glowing result. Caroline had a photograph of a young person and had painted it in black, white and greys to start with.  She pointed out that it is vital to get tonal values set first. Working from light to dark, and using either a glaze medium or cheap paints, apply a wash, which allows the dark image to show through. The use of cheaper acrylic paints is suggested because they have less pigment in them therefore a glaze effect is much easier. Using a filbert brush, mix a light flesh tone and add it to the pale area of the face, adding more pigment layer by layer. The filbert brush doesn't give hard edges. This is the result needed with this type of portrait painting. Add pink to the image, bringing in the warmth. At this stage you can go back and forth between the dark and light areas. Working wet in wet blends better, which means you can mix colours on the page if you want to. Use solid paint for definition, and block in with white if you make a mistake, then start again as it is very easy to go dark in portraits. Palate: Cadmium Red, Yellow Ochre, Cobalt Blue, Burnt Sienna, Hookers Green, Cadmium Red medium. It was agreed that this was a really helpful session for those of us that aspire to portrait painting, as this technique allows a very gradual build of a work instead of the dramatic and sometimes disappointing results of using solid paint from the outset. The use of glazes results in a real glow in the work which can't be achieved with the use of direct non layered painting.

Caroline began her demonstration with some points to consider before starting an open air painting session. Reconnoitre before choosing a site. Are there a lot of possibly intrusive people around? Consider the weight of your equipment. A half-size easel will ease the load, as you may have to climb for a better vantage point Do some thumbnails to help decide on your composition If using acrylic paints, remember that they will dry more quickly outside. Use a stay-wet palate Once you are settled and starting to paint, lay down light tones and darks at the outset, bearing in mind the changing light as time passes. Get your tonal values down at the beginning. She suggested working with big brushes to do this, to avoid “fiddling”. Outdoor painting needs you to make light colours lighter and darks darker, which will compensate for indoor light levels. Method: Working from the back to the front of the scene in light tones…look-paint, look-paint. To achieve shafts of light, use a glaze at the end of the work. Focus on lights and darks is most important. As an example, your composition should be 70% cold and 30% warm colours or vice versa. Keep a varied selection of greens and add a few browns to your palate for woodland scenes. Use a rigger for the small upper branches, which can be added later, along with foliage. Lastly – Be rougher and have fun with it!!

The Bauhaus (trans. School of Building) was founded in Weimar in 1919 by Walter Gropius, who was very interested in manufacturing combined with art. It was created as a centre for all arts.  The Arts & Crafts movement was a big influence, as, under William Morris, it espoused the idea of functionality and beauty. After a while the medieval forms were thrown out and a more stripped down model favoured. The school had pottery departments, furniture workshops   and produced posters in the art department. After a while, metal became favoured over wood and the material for chairs and tables. Famous artists such as Kandinsky and Paul Klee taught there, and many others aspired to join the teaching staff, such was the growing reputation. Below is a diagram of the comprehensive course offered after the move to Dessau. There was a strong influence from Mondrian’s works, which is apparent in the building at Dessau, and the modernist architecture of the building set a style for many buildings. In 1932 the school moved to Berlin, where, under political pressure, it was closed by its leadership in 1933. Caroline showed us many images of the furniture produced by the school, which cannot appear here, due to copyright constraints, but for those interested, the internet has many images on Google Images under Bauhaus furniture. Some will seem familiar, as indeed they are. The influence is very strong in today’s market place with the growing taste for modernist style in the home. The talk was very interesting, particularly as we are surrounded by furniture and design whose origins are in the Bauhaus. Ikea, although a Swedish company with the Karl & Karin Larsson historical connection, has many pieces reflective of this famous German school.

On the 24th May Caroline gave us a talk and demonstration on “Pop Art”. She started by telling us that although we associate pop art with the 50’s and 60’s, it emerged as early as the 1920’s. Artists were reacting against traditional movements typical of the Victorian era as well as the upheaval of WW1. They were looking forward to a brighter future and this was reflected in painting and design. Caroline showed us a jazzy print of a number five that could easily have been designed in the 1960’s but was in fact created about 1920. Pop Art was also associated with Art Deco and the Dada movement. After the Second World War artists again were looking at society anew and taking inspiration from consumer items and were commenting on the roles of men and women. Caroline showed us some more familiar images including Richard Hamilton’s collage of a man flexing his muscles while a woman sits on a sofa, surrounded by modern day trappings. Richard Hamilton was British but most of the artists we are familiar with were from the US, including Oldenberg, Lichtenstein, Rauschenberg and Warhol. Much of their work took a wry look at the superficiality of American life. Lichtenstein was inspired by cartoons and magazine images to make his paintings, such as a woman’s manicured fingers using a spray can or a high heeled shoe stepping on a pedal bin. He was also keen on using images of glamorous couples in sports cars, or macho pilots in planes with comments floating in speech bubbles. Caroline took her inspiration from Lichtenstein’s cartoon paintings to demonstrate an idea for a take on contemporary life. Using a felt tip she drew a typical family out to lunch at a fast food restaurant, all of them glued to their...

In discussing the differences between painting young and old faces, Caroline began with a very helpful hint: use wet in wet for young smooth faces, wash over first and drop in the colour, giving the bloom on the cheeks. The model this week was a Cuban woman of some years, accompanied by her cigar. Starting by penciling in the features, beginning at the nose, Caroline then outlined the mouth and lastly the eyes. To paint this very colourful subject, the following palette was used: Firstly she used a weak yellow wash generally. Yellow Ochre was the base colour, mixed with red & green. For the brown, Caroline always mixes her own with red and green. For the wrinkles she mixed Cadmium Deep Red with Ultramarine and Yellow Ochre was made and orange for the eye sockets. For the olive green of the cheek patch and background, Hookers Green, Claret or Cherry red were used and a purple used for the lips. We all watched with awe as the aged face emerged under Caroline’s deft brushwork. The following pictures give an idea of the gradual building of the portrait.

Caroline introduced a number of ways to produce washes, using both a paintbrush and other materials to get varied effects. The first was with an upright board and brush: Wet on dry Wet on wet Graded Wet on dry: using a flat 1” brush and dark paint, not too water brush once across and drag down for a drop down effect Wet in wet: using very clean water and wet paper, soak in for a minute. Paint across quickly…don’t over-work, then paint across. Graded: Start with a sideways sweep and use less colour for a graded effect. Clouds can be inserted by using a balled tissue to remove the paint. Note: Kurt Jackson used watery paint and turned the board sideways to dribble and splatters too! Flat work using materials for application  Cling film: using strong colours, apply cling film and ruche it. Leave to dry before removing for a foliage effect. Can also be used for rocks, using dark brown, green and wet in wet red. Washing-up liquid: can be used for waves by squirting into applied wet paint. Dry brushing: on very dry paint, drag a dry brush across. Fan brush: use to produce a wood grain effect Oil pastels: use colour free pastels and make marks, then brush over with a wash of colour. Salt: put on a wash, and quickly sprinkle on salt. Leave until fully dry before brushing off the salt. Good for a rain effect or snow on a dark ground. Scratching:  Apply the wash then then scratch with scissors to make trees. Scratch downwards so paint goes into runnels.