Adventurous Artists 11th January

The next meeting of the Adventurous Artists Group will be in the City Art Gallery on Friday 11th January 2019 from 10-15am onwards. Meet at the top of the stairs - stools are provided.

Next main meeting is Wednesday 23rd January for our "Genius Night" Contact Di ASAP to sign up for your painting.

Art Extra Xmas meeeting

To celebrate the final meeting of 2018 we each brought a painting which meant something to us. We then heard stories ranging from pets,(Ann) gardens,(Mary)the weather,(Tony) a self- portrait(June) Biggleswade,(Pat) and travelling from the Grand Canal in Venice(Claire) to an old house in France.(Betty) These fascinating stories and beautiful poems by Pat with a few "nibbles" made an excellent start to the Christmas season.
 Next Art Extra afternoon is January 18th 2019, 1-30pm to 3-30pm. Names to Claire to get a place.

  

PHOTOGRAPHS ADVENTUROUS ARTISTS

The following were taken on the last outing.

ADVENTUROUS ARTISTS AT HOME

REPORT FROM DI

SKETCHING AT HOME IN DECEMBER

Our sketching group had to hastily re-locate when the King Rufus at Eling was not expecting their visit. I had mistakenly made arrangements with the pub of the same name (but different phone number) at Chandlers Ford. So six of us came to be comfortably seated in a living room which was a lot warmer than the air outside. The subject of most of the sketches was a large anthurium plant with heart-shaped leaves and deep pink flower bracts. Everyone rose to the challenge and the resulting sketches were beautiful. 

Most of us might not usually sit at home and sketch, but it is well worth the effort in order to test our drawing skills on a different subject.

Di Alexander

GET READY FOR JANUARY

MESSAGE FROM DI

WED 23^RD JANUARY 2019  

THREE SCORE CLUB TOTTON 7.30 p.m. ‘GENIUS NIGHT’ (The COMPETITION open to T.A.S. Members)

 

Paint your version of a famous painting of your choice.

Mount / frame it according to the medium and support that you use. Although framing is not mandatory please provide a backing so that it can be displayed vertically.

 

Enter the Genius Night Competition by contacting Di Alexander  email dga@dialexander.co.uk or telephone 07979905192  preferably by 1^st January confirming that you are happy to talk to members about what it was like to paint it and what you learnt about the artist. You will hopefully give permission for your work to be featured online too.

You could bring to the meeting: your painting, notes to remind yourself what to say and additional information (books/pictures/cards, etc.) about your chosen artist.

 

We will vote for the most interesting/best entry at the end of the evening.

 

The prize will be £20 cash.

 

You can of course paint a famous painting and bring it to the meeting without entering the competition. This will be a fun evening with a difference! 

Monochrome portrait Demonstration

Monochrome portrait Demonstration by Susan Kerrigan-Harris  

We are grateful to Susan for doing  this demonstration at short notice after the regrettable and unavoidable cancellation by the previous demonstrator.

The subject for her monochrome pastel painting was a Russian girl who lives in Italy. Monochrome paintings are used by Susan as tonal studies for later colour paintings.

Working from a mobile phone photograph onto a light grey velour pastel paper she uses a mixture of hard and soft pastels (Unison)and pastel pencils (Caran d'Arche soft and Derwent or Pitt hard). Test the pastel or pencil on the hand to determine hardness and remove shininess by rubbing on sandpaper.

         There are about four types of pastel paper ranging in "tooth" from velour to sandpaper. Using velour paper means that the pastel has to be rubbed to get a dense amount of colour on the paper but does allow a light covering to catch if necessary. With pencils the side of the pencil is used to make a mark not the tip.

 Excess can be removed with a photographic blower brush and highlights taken out with  a torchon or blender. The painting is sprayed very lightly with fixative.

To sharpen pencils use a craft knife in a scooping movement and finish to a point with sandpaper.

Powder or Pan pastels can be painted on with a sponge brush for backgrounds.  

Before beginning a painting study the subject carefully to try to understand the character.

Do an outline drawing of the face and hair to begin and then concentrate firstly on the eyes. White is used for the whites of the eye and to create highlights in the centre of the eye as well as on the eyelids, under eyebrows, lips, cheekbones and hair etc. It is important to produce a slight dip in the corner of the eye. Eye lashes are painted by using a Payne's Grey pastel pencil and starting by putting in scattered lashes then filling the gaps.

Dark areas are painted using the side of the pastel and details with a dark pencil.

A very light covering of light grey pastel is put on in appropriate areas to emphasise the highlights.

 This was a fascinating demonstration and we look forward to another evening with another subject.

At the Tea Break

Nearly Finished

 SUSAN ALSO WROTE LATER:- 
What a wonderful experience last night, I had a great time!  I have finished both portraits this morning so thought I would send them on to you to share with your members.  The little girl just fell out of my pencil today and I
finished her in 1.5 hours. That might just be a record lol!

Toddler

I forgot to mention last night that anyone who is on facebook might be interested in my pastel group.  I post pastel tips and techniques and videos of what I'm working on.   Here is the link:  https://www.facebook.com/groups/softpasteltips/ 
Best Wishes and Happy Christmas
Sue Kerrigan-Harris
www.skhportraits.co.uk
07740 282399

Finished portrait

ALSO ON THE EVENING WERE THE FOLLOWING ON THE DISPLAY TABLE :-

The Art Journey table had Christmas cards by Maria Hillman and an acrylic painting on Aluminium Composite Panel (primed with gesso) painted by Di