Social Evenings
03/04/2024
We enjoyed another social event last night with many members attending.
Mariangello Williams gave an interesting talk about Still Life. She included artists Hans Holbein, Paul Gauguin, Vincent Van Gogh, Johannes Vermeer, Charles Rennie Mackintosh. It was fascinating to realise how much history can be in a painting. Thank you Mariangello for doing so much research into the subject.
After a coffee and chat break we looked at members' art. There was an array of paintings done on some unusual objects! The subject was ‘Your dream home’. We had such a laugh together to see what members had painted on. The vote for a winner was very close. Sheila Minchin and Lorna Porter shared first place.
Our next Social Evening is Tuesday 7th May 7pm. Abstract Art facilitated by Melanie Bettridge and Hilary Bird. The Competition will follow, so please bring along your paintings on ‘Still Life’ for us to share.
Previous Demonstrations & Workshops
Jake Winkle - 20 March
Jake Winkle gave members a superb demonstration this afternoon.
Jake is a water colourist who is inspired by light and movement. His paintings are a reflection of the world around him. It was good to see over 40 people in attendance, including 3 new members and 2 visitors.
Jake discussed his materials used, his style and the colours he chooses. He then painted a giraffe and after a coffee break an owl. He talked about using sticky paint as opposed to watery paint, using lots of water, lost and found objects, avoiding ‘cauliflowers’ (unless that is the look you would like!). Cool colours next to warm colours. Mixing blacks using two dark colours as this creates more interest. Sometimes it's good to leave white unpainted areas to allow the painting to breathe.
So many other helpful ideas for us to use in our own art.
February 2024 - Louise Bougourd
Renowned abstract artist, Louise Bougourd gave a demonstration in February. It was attended by over 50 members.
Claire Balmer summarised the afternoon:
This afternoon the Exmouth Art Group were treated to a wonderful demonstration by abstract landscape artist, Louise Bougourd.
Louise started her artistic career as a watercolourist but has moved to mixed media and acrylics. Her inspiration is drawn from the landscape and her emotional response to it.
Although not a plein air artist, she explained that it is important to her to spend time in a place to ‘feel’ and absorb her response to it, which she then transfers to her canvas. At the moment her most significant emotions are peace and hope and she uses colours to invoke those emotions.
Her chief medium is acrylic paint (sometimes with oil paint over). She also loves the strong lines she can add with watercolour crayons (eg stabilo woodies) and often adds paper collage. Today she painted a loose representation of a brook near Dartmoor using a 3 colour palette of a greeny brown, orangey red and neon pink with white.
Painting without an outline and being unafraid of the paint dripping and dribbling (sometimes by spaying additional water and turning her canvas onto its side), Louise filled in colour and added light using tools such as flat brushes (including a large DIY brush), palette knives and a bowl scraper! She showed us how she lifted and transferred paint with greaseproof paper and softened corners with rubber gloved fingers!
She took pictures of her work along the way and turned the image to black and white to distinguish ‘holes’ in the colour or highlight areas that should be lightened or darkened. She explained that she occasionally uses masking tape to retain areas she especially likes too.
The speedy result was a beautiful, exciting and dynamic abstract landscape painted in unusual but expressive and enthusiastic colours.
Stunning! Thank you Louise.
