Caroline’s subject this week was “fish, painted in watercolour”. The vibrancy of the medium was well suited to this subject as can be seen in her beautiful rendition of a tropical fish. First Caroline lightly outlined the fish in pencil then applied the fish scales and part of the body in a light tone. She … Read more
Before starting the drawing, Caroline gave a few tips on working in charcoal: Sandpaper the paper for dramatic marks Use good textured paper Think … Where are my darkest shadows going to be? WORK BIG! Blocking in very lightly, Caroline sketched out the group of bottles. Using light strokes to plot … Read more
The best charcoal to use is Windsor and Newton as it has good deep coverage and is just lovely to use. Always break the stick into a smaller piece and then you can use it side on or using a corner. You should use a rough paper with a tooth to give the charcoal something … Read more
When working in watercolour you should always work light to dark. Caroline started by lightly sketching the outlines of the leaves in pencil and then she used masking fluid to map out the main veins. Then it was left to dry. Using a round brush with a point she started by putting a wash of … Read more
Caroline used the Pre-Raphaelites to demonstrate very good use of rest areas in paintings. Rest areas are essential to allow the viewer to easily move their eyes around the space. Use of colour is also effective in leading the viewer around the painting. Cool colours will recede and as such will be a good choice … Read more
All colours are made up of combinations of different pigments. The resulting colour can be either cold or warm depending upon the exact proportions of each pigment used. When selecting your palette you should choose one of both cold and warm for each colour . For example a cool version of red would be Cadmium … Read more
Caroline Marsland, our tutor gave a demonstration of lino cutting at our July wednesday class. I have taken the liberty of copying the description of lino cutting from ‘Gradually Greener in Print making’ from the web site. Carolines comments and instructions are added at the end. “What is a Linocut?: Linocuts are very similar to … Read more