Monthly Archives: April 2016

Workshop For Fraser Valley Artists, Surrey BC

I had the great pleasure of doing a 3 day workshop for the Fraser Valley Artists in Surrey BC, April 1-3.  It was an urban landscape workshop.  Most participants were relatively new to this subject matter. That’s actually an advantage because I like to start off by practicing and playing with some of the urban landscape elements.

I find every workshop is different and has it’s own flavour. This workshop was a little different in that the participants were by and large very accomplished artists.  That required me to go a little further in terms of my demos.  However, I find that it is nearly  always beneficial to go a little past my comfort zone and that was the case this time.

Demo 1

I like to get the people painting as soon as possible so we started practicing how to paint figures and cars the first morning and them I demoed in the afternoon.  The class wanted to see me complete as much of the painting as possible in class so I didn’t get to work on it that night in the hotel (which I love doing). It’s based on a view of St Mary’s Church in Calgary.  In the reference photo the street is lined with banners but I’ve grown tired of painting banners so I changed them to palm trees.  This is that demo at the end of the workshop.

Rex Beanland, Demo 1 end of workshop

Demo 1 end of workshop

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When I got home I finished it off like this.  I felt that it need something in the sky to solidify that area and I love the trolley lines of Vancouver so they were added.

 

Rex Beanland, St Mary's (Surrey Workshop), watercolour, 21 x 14

Demo 1 final

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s been said that it’s better to leave a painting a bit underworked rather than a bit overworked and I did overwork it somewhat but I still like it.

 

Demo 2

The second demo was a brand new painting for me.  I just love this particular grouping of cars and I was determined to down play the buildings in order to serve the story happening in the foreground.  This is how it looked at the end of the workshop.  I like the framing device of having darker figure shapes at each side of the painting.

Rex Beanland, Demo 2 end of workshop

Demo 2 end of workshop

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the demo as far as I’ve taken it.  It’s still only  about 75% finished but I like it so much that I want to live with it for a while in order to see what it needs.

Rex Beanland, Empire Cars, watercolour, 14 x 21

Demo 2 final

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Demo 3

We only had half a day for the third demo so I didn’t get much finished.  I find the perspective of this image to be very interesting even though the distortion is an artifact caused by the nature of a camera lens.

Rex Beanland, Demo 3 end of workshop

Demo 3 end of workshop

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(I have made a video clip analyzing this painting that you might find useful).  It’s actually quite a simple painting even though it looks hard.  Here is the final version.

 

Rex Beanland, Eighth Ave Place, watercolour, 14 x 11

Demo 3 final

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I was very impressed with all the paintings produced by the group and I managed to get photos of a couple of examples.  These are also not complete but show a strong grasp of all the ideas that we covered.

Rex Beanland, Student sample Wendy

Wendy Mould

Rex Beanland, Student sample Audrey

Audrey Bakewell

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Class

The artists who attended the workshop were a very friendly, very accomplished and very enthusiastic group.   There was a lot of laughter.   I have come to find that when a workshop works well I’m always inspired to paint more and that was my experience with this weekend.  Here are some shots of the class.

Rex Beanland, Class Photo Surrey Workshop

Class Photo

Rex Beanland, The class at play

The class at play

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rex Beanland, Rex demos

Rex demos

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I would like to thank the Fraser Valley Artists for the invitation.

If you would like to see one of the participants take on the workshop visit Wendy Mould’s blog.