Blog

Day One Paint your Pet workshop  for march 2024 was another successful weekend, with 4 students all creating wonderful pieces of artwork.  My studio is a great space for workshop’s. A maximum of 8 people can sit in a quiet room with great light, the smaller group size means there is more time to spend with each student.  The first step is drawing the image, I prefer to use a grid system for my student teaching as it creates a well proportioned image. It is easy to use and can be used to enlarge or reduce the image sizes, plus work out the best placement for the final image.  This workshop was a Rainbow workshop, using my signature bright coloured backgrounds.  This is how the first stage of painting looks at the end of day 1. Day two With the backgrounds dry and completed we now work on the subjects. I demonstrate various smaller images to show how to paint White, Brown and Black subjects, this helps to explain how my colour theory of warm and cool colours can be used, also the mixing of colours.  The students final work always amazes me, they step out of their comfort zone and experiment with colours they wouldn’t normally dream of. Each finished piece has their individual style, I find now,  most of my students are returning for other workshops,  As you can see each piece is wonderful! the final stages are adding the “Whitework” using a white gouache, and some penwork, some prefer no penwork ,  I prefer the pen as I am more of an illustrator in style, and I like my images to stand out a bit more. I use a Rotoring draughtsman pen for all my pen work.  My Demonstration piece This is “Mr Buttons”, A commissioned portrait that I used to demonstrate my Black animal subjects. As you can see there is no black but a mix of blues, greens, magentas and purples. I use purple under a coat of Indigo for my “Blackest” parts.  Happy faces! Show and tell , not everyone likes to be in photos, but I am always so proud of the work the students produce.  These workshops are relaxed, social events with a huge amount of learning, the fact that my students come back for more means I must be doing something right!  Look out for my workshops, they are advertised on my Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/YvonnesArtwork The next one is a day workshop for the basics of watercolours, suitable for beginners or those already painting,  and for people interested in wishing to take up  watercolour painting but don’t know where to start.  It will cover paper choices, paints, brushes, stretching paper, drawing, mixing colours using my warm and cool palette.  Date: April 13th 2024  Please contact me for more information.