Mike Skidmore painting Still Life

 

Mike is a professional artist who paints mainly portraits and still life subjects. As well as demonstrations Mike runs excellent workshops and on-line tutorials.  After attending art college in the 70's which sapped his confidence Mike now teaches his students to have confidence in themselves and not be too self critical - " look at the "best bits" and not the others and try to get more of them."

 

Starting with a pencil drawing of the subject on canvas Mike uses a grid system to transfer it from a photograph. The photograph is small as this helps to get the subject with the correct detail for the optimum viewing distance as the artist can only see a small amount of detail when working. The canvas is primed with a very thin layer of Paynes Grey and Titanium White. Then using Paynes Grey and Raw Umber the shapes of the gasses were painted in. Highlights were added with dilute acrylic Titanium White using a sable brush trying to get the basic shapes not an exact copy.

Mike uses a limited palette of 4 or 5 colours.  If he finds a pleasing mix of colours he stores the mix in a jar in the freezer for possible future use!

Continuing with oil paint Mike mixes a very thin glaze of Ivory Black and Raw Umber with a medium of:- 4 parts real turps : 3 parts linseed oil (boiled - raw takes too long to dry) : 3 parts Dammar varnish : 1 part Venetian turps. The final glaze is done with a blending brush. Using a cloth Mike wipes out some of the lighter areas on the glasses then softens the edges. The outlines of the glasses are then re-affirmed using a mix of Ivory Black and Raw Umber. Raw umber is used to put in the darker tones over the wet paint of the glaze using fairly thin paint.

Continuing to the highlights Mike puts in a darker base tone by  using thin Titainium White  which picks up some of the underlying colour . He then adds slightly thicker paint until the main highlight is reached which is painted with a really thick coat. This helps the highlights stand out from the darker areas.

 The cloth is painted flat first then a glaze put over the shadow areas. The highlights are put in using the sable brush and thick paint.  A mix of Raw Umber, Ivory Black and Titanium White are  used to paint the cloth between the shadows. Then using the blending brush white is worked over the shadows to soften them following the shape of the folds with the brush. Finally more highlights are added as necessary.

 

This was one of the best demonstrations we have seen. Mike is very informative and with his humorous way of teaching we learnt much during a very entertaining evening.

 

Mike



Final Painting        



Tea Break

Adventurous Artists in May

 

The sketching group met at the Testwood Lakes on Friday 13th. Most of us tackled the challenge of drawing trees and foliage and afterwards had a refreshment break in the visitor's centre.

The next meeting of the Adventurous Artists Sketching Group will be on FRIDAY  10th JUNE at ST. MICHAELS CHURCH, in the centre of LYNDHURST at 10.15 for 10.30 am. The church has a marvellous Pre-Raphaelite interior.

Parking on the outskirts at Boulton's Bench is free but the central car park has charges.  

Fiona Peart Demonstration

Water-colour Demonstration by Fiona Peart

We welcomed Fiona accompanied by her husband, the well known artist Terry Harrison, to our April Demonstration evening. 

Fiona studied painting and drawing at the Flemish Academy of Fine Art in Leuven in Belgium and went on to become well known as a painter, publishing books and demonstrating and running workshops to adults in this country and abroad. Her aim for the evening was to show the difference in technique used for painting outside and in the studio.

The subject for the first part of the evening was a street scene with horse-riders and cars but based on a photograph and painted in the studio. An outline drawing was made on Bockingford 140 lbs cotton rag paper and the highlights masked out. The colours are then worked out using a limited palette. The house colours are brown and gold darkened with blue/violet for shadows. The skin colour is orange/blue and foliage green/yellow The horses are brown/orange and the road blue with gold.

The paper is attached by the top only with masking tape then wetted and, when fully stretched, taped on the other sides. Large washes are put on over the paper covering the background houses, horses and road. The aim is to get rid of any white paper (the highlights are under the masking fluid). The paper is then dried. If painting outside everything has to be done in one layer but in the studio layers of washes are used.

Fiona then continued to paint the rest of the picture using the flat of the brush to move the paint around - if the tip is used more paint is added. She used the stippling brush for the foliage using an edge of paper to make a clean edge on the roof. Nothing should be painted too accurately and she puts colours on quickly next to each other so that they mix slightly. The shadows were painted last and the paper dried thoroughly. Finally the masking fluid was removed using a tissue or handkerchief and very bright areas toned down. As a last touch the reins were added with a pointer brush.

        Fiona's next painting was of children playing in the sea as a sketch in water-colour. First plenty of colour was mixed on the palette. Fiona uses two brushes for her outdoor sketching - one for flesh colour ( Indian Red or Burnt Sienna or pink and gold darkened with her "bluebell" colour)  and the other for clothes etc.

        She starts with the hair and uses the brushes loaded with the appropriate colour to paint the rest of the body but painting only where there are shadows. This allows the viewer to complete the picture in their mind for themselves A single stroke is used for each limb varying the pressure on the brush to alter the width. Several subjects are used to complete a picture of "one" person. The colours are allowed to mix and run to give more interest. Finally shadows are painted in using the brush held sideways. Water can be added at a later time.

        Fiona is an outstanding teacher and demonstrator. We all learnt a great deal and had a brilliantly entertaining and memorable evening so "Thank you very much" Fiona!  

 

 

Finished horserider painting

 





Tea Break

End of the Evening

SKETCHING AT KING JOHN'S HOUSE

Our Adventurous Artists April sketching morning took place at the Picturesque King John’s House garden in Romsey. The garden is maintained by a team of volunteers who take great pride in the garden, planted to complement the old house. The spring sunshine, birds singing and the flowers bursting into bloom made it very pleasant. There were comments of: “It’s so peaceful”and “we must come back again”. The resulting sketches showed how many of us were inspired by the surroundings. [Do try and see the  art exhibition ‘Four Shades of Purple’ by local artists at King John’s house from 30th April until 2nd May.]

 

The next sketching morning will be on Friday 13th May at Testwood Lakes. The entrance is a gateway off Brunel Road at the Calmore Industrial Estate, SO40 3WX. Parking and entry is free of charge and, thanks to Claire Palmer. we have the use of the facilities at the visitor centre.

 

 

 

ADVENTUROUS ARTISTS IN ROMSEY.

 

The next outing is to King John's House, Church Street,  Romsey  meeting at 10-30am this Friday 8th April. King Johns is a very old and interesting building near the Abbey with a beautiful garden and excellent tea shop serving light lunches. Parking is available just behind the House in the Latimer Street car-park  

New Members.

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Helen reports:-

There are currently places available to become a member of Totton Art Society for  2016-17 for the annual subscription of £20 - a true bargain.  Beginners to Advanced fellow artist are all welcome as there is something for every level and interest. If you don't want to commit to joining at the moment then you are welcome to visit us as a guest for £3 for the evening. Keep visiting our Blog and Web-site to see what demonstrations are coming up. We look forward to welcoming you soon.

 

New Committee Members  

There are two members which we must now welcome to the Committee - Elaine Hanham and Janet Horton. We hope they will enjoy their time as Committee members. We also thank Pat Weller for all the years she has acted as Vice-President.

Pat has been a strong working quietly in the background and always there when needed. We thank her for her help and dedication.

AGM 2016 and TALK by CHERYL DAY

MARCH 23RD  2016  A.G.M. and TALK BY  CHERYL DAY.

 

A detailed account of the Committee changes will appear later but the most important item is the resignation of Anne Hamerton as our Chairman after many years. She has been the inspiration for many changes in the society (e.g. the use of the video camera for demonstrations) and has seen them through to a high standard. Anne has always been  keen to try out new ideas and is usually at the heart of any event making sure it all goes smoothly. We are all very grateful for all the time and effort she has put into the Society and hope that now she will enjoy spending time on her own painting and enjoying herself.

In her place we welcome Kate Rodrigues. Kate is already known to us as an accomplished artist and has recently run a Collage workshop for us. With her warmth and enthusiasm we are pleased she has consented to be our Chairperson and wish her great success and all our support for the future.  

 

After the A.G.M. we continued with a talk by Cheryl Day.

 

Cheryl  has worked for the Ambulance Service since 1989 and took up painting after seeing the work of another wildlife artist and subsequently attending an evening class.

Besides learning techniques it was during the classes that she realised the importance of contrast in a painting.

 Cheryl started with graphite and then felt the need for colour in her work and so went on to using pastels. She worked with finely pointed pastel pencils and Unison pastels. Pastel paintings are difficult to transport and are often mistreated at exhibitions so after a couple of years she started using acrylics. Cheryl also likes oils and intends to do more work with them. Carbon pencils are another favourite medium sometimes used with colour and acrylic ink. The carbon pencils give a very dense black.  Acrylic retarder is mixed with the acrylic medium 1-1 and blended in to produce a very smooth background. Sometimes she uses acrylic ink in an air-spray. Green is not a recommended colour for the background and Cheryl usually prefers a warm brown-orange colour.   She prefers to work on paper to an A3 size although she has found that paintings of young animals work well at large sizes but older ones don't.

Cheryl starts by getting the eyes and prominent features accurately depicted and tends to concentrate on one area at a time. The overall composition is based on the natural posture of the animal. She takes many reference photographs of her subject from as many different positions as possible  including close-ups of e.g. tails, ears etc. 

The first exhibitions Cheryl entered were at Marwell but as these no longer take place she enters the National Exhibition of Wildlife Art in the Wirral.  She also publicises her pictures on her website and on Facebook making sure that they are well covered for copyright and safe from plagiarism. Cards are printed by a printer but she uses a Canon pro 5000 printer to make her own large prints doing 3-4 for each image. 

Working during the day means that Cheryl only paints in the evenings and usually produces 6-8 paintings a year.

We are very grateful to Cheryl for giving up an evening to tell us about her painting life which we found absorbing and inspiring . So "Thank You", Cheryl, very much!