It was a great workshop at Swinton’s Art Supplies this past weekend. The makeup of the class was primarily beginning or returning watercolourists as well as a number of oil and acrylic painters trying out watercolour.
It was a very successful workshop. As one participant commented I worked them hard but the quality of the work they produced shows that it was all very worthwhile. Learning and growth do take some effort.
I’ve said for quite a while that the success of a workshop, for me, is primarily judged by what the students get out of it. I’m finding more and more that what they get out of it comes out in the paintings that they produce. In this workshop in spite of the challenge inherent in each painting the quality of all paintings was very high. In other words the class average was really good. That gives me a lot of satisfaction.
I did 2 demos both of which I finished up at home.
The first is what I call St Stephen because the main subject seems to rule the street which happens to be Stephen Ave.
The second demo was a fairly new image for me. It is a great teaching image with lots of colour and value opportunities. It’s called Granville Street.
All in all it was a wonderful way to spend a weekend. Here is the class at work.
And here is the class photo.
I was unable to get a shot of everyone’s painting and no one finished but I did manage to get a couple of examples of the work in progress. These examples are very representative and show how well the lesson on value was put into action.
I always get participants to fill out an evaluation form and a couple of comments were very gratifying. One student said, “I love how you explain your intention of how you compose the painting and the changes you made to the reference photo”
I also needed to ask everyone to do a drawing that included perspective which traditionally is very hard for some people. I prepared this image that I thought would help and the feedback I got was that it was very helpful.
I also include in all my workshops little mini lessons on people, cars, value etc and another comment made me glad that I do that. “The warm up with drawing/painting cars and people was very helpful”.
Just for your interest I’m including the video she is referring to.
A number of people were asking so just to remind everyone that my next workshop is a brand new one for me – Transparent Watercolour Portraits at the
Leighton Centre
June 27 – 28,
403-931-3633