Okay a great leap for me, instead of teaching, I'm stepping back and taking a workshop. What fun! I now know I'm a perpetual student because I just loved it.
Carol Marine is an amazing artist, great teacher, very funny and her demos are dynamite. What more can you want? Everyone loved it.We had a great group, about 18 of us, from all parts. One woman came from as far away as Cape Breton in eastern Canada. Mostly though from Vancouver and the Island. I will add some scenes from the workshop and some of Carol's beautiful demos. They are lovely in their simplicity, great composition, color and minimal brushstrokes. All part of the course for the week. She emphasized squinting, squinting and more squinting to see values and colour. Some of the exercises were capturing the image with lesser brushstrokes from 20 down to 10. Challenging but it worked to start seeing things simply.
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| Here we are with only 1 guy among us. Carol is comfortably posed across us! Lucky she is light as a feather. I'm second from the right front row! |
We started out with Carol's favourite apples the first day. On Day 2 orange slices. A white cup and a very tiny eggplant Day 3 . A beautiful smoky blown glass vase and scissors, Day 4. And finally a broken egg in a green glass dish on day 5. Everyone was spellbound with the demos but that didn't rule out many questions and much laughter. One common question asked, What colors did you mix for that color?? To which Carol would inevitably reply "Red, Yellow, blue and a bit of white! In other words almost all colors are degrees of grey.
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| Vase and scissors this is part of the demo and not quite finished here. |
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Last demo, an egg and a fork are under way.
Red, yellow, blue and a bit of white written on the back of this Tee
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| This photo captures some of the enthusiasm Carol brings to her painting and teaching |
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| Watching one of the daily demos. Some of my efforts below. |
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| My apple studies- Upper left 20 brushstrokes, upper right 15, btm. left 10 strokes, and btm. right no limit. This teaches one to really observe subtle changes in color and value but simplify too. |
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| Study in yellow 6 x 6" |
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| Study of a cup and oranges- Day 2 - 6" x 6" |
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| On our last day I tried the egg painting too. It was fun to paint the yolk . All in all it was a challenging week, but it's good to put yourself into a new venue that helps you to stretch a bit and see things in a different light. Still lots to learn about still life painting in this style. I'll continue to explore the possibilities. I would highly recommend Carol's workshop if you get an opportunity to go. |
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And a final reminder from Carol, almost all mixed colors are greys - in various proportions of red, yellow, blue and maybe a bit of white , depending on the grey.
Thanks also to the organizer of this great workshop, Mary Stewart in Nanaimo. She did a fabulous job of keeping it all running smoothly. She kept us in daily snacks, coffee and tea throughout the week and saw to it that everyone had everything they needed. Kudos Mary!
Happy painting everyone! I'm back in San Miguel trying out some new still life ideas. It's challenging and I'm still working it through but will post a few things in a bit. Donna |
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