Spring 2020 Art Dates with Claire Warner

(Tree: Ham Yard Hotel London)

In amongst all the festive festivities Claire and I have put together next term's Art dates!

Please email me if you would like any further information

February

Wednesday 26th - Watercolour "Tulips"

Thursday 27th - Pen & Wash "A Spanish Port"

March

Tuesday 3rd - Watercolour "Boats/Reflections/Mist in Scotland"

Friday 13th - Watercolour for Beginners & Refreshers

April

Wednesday 1st - Watercolour "Poppies"

Thursday 2nd - Pen & Wash "Down on the Farm"

Tuesday 7th - Acrylics "Under the Waves"

All our classes run from 9:30am - approx 3pm and cost £75 (acrylics and pen & wash cost £80)

All of your materials are included in this price along with a 2 course lunch with wine and refreshments throughout the day.

(Gift vouchers are available for a specific class)

Acrylics - Seascape

Another wonderfully mellow day with sunshine at Treetops.

Today, Claire showed us Acrylics with texture.

We painted a seascape taken from Porthmeor Beach in St Ives, with the waves crashing against the rocks.

Having painted the sky, sea and sand with only flat brushes, we then used texture modelling paste to create the rocks and swirling frothy waves that crash onto the beach.  This can be done with either a palette knife or fingers. 

The paste takes a while to dry, so we left it to work it's magic whilst we had lunch.

To achieve a lovely smooth finish, especially on our skies we used another product called liquifying medium, this gives a really good fluidity to the paint.

We used some great colours, and did alot of mixing, if you look carefully amongst the rocks, you will see aubergines, reds, yellows, greens.  They may have been rocks, but there were parts in the sunshine, parts covered in seaweed, mussels and limpets, we really needed to give them some texture.

Towards the end we went back into the sea to create some waves and colour, which really brought the paintings to life.

Then for my favourite part, flicking with toothbrushes!

Perfect for creating spray at the crashing wave moment!

This gorgeous blue painting was done by one our ladies of the beautiful sea in Madeira.

I need a trip to the seaside now .....

Spaces Available ....

Somewhere the sunshine and warmth are just waiting ....

In the meantime, our classes are filling up for next term, here is a reminder of what is available:

Beginners Watercolour

Tuesday 18 June

9.30am - 3pm

£70

All materials and a 2 course lunch included

3 spaces left

Sunflowers in Watercolour

Wednesday 19 June

9.30am - 3pm

£70

All materials and a 2 course lunch included

1 spaces left

Coastal Watercolour

Wednesday 3 July

9.30am - 3pm

£70

All materials and a 2 course included

4 places left

To book please either call or email me.

Gift vouchers are available.

Further Treetops information is available on the website:

Treetops

NEW - Summer Term Watercolour Dates

(Blue Skies Watergate Bay - March 2013)

Here are our new dates for next term, bookings are now being taken:

Wednesday 24 April - Seascapes with Acrylics

Using flat brushes and palette knives.  Lively and exciting!

Tuesday 14 May - Beautiful Bluebells

A watercolour picture full of atmosphere.  A lovely subject for the beginning of Summer, depicting the soft misty carpet of mauve and purple flowers in a woodland scene.  (New image for 2013).

Wednesday 12 June - A Country Walk

We will paint an interesting and colourful Summer landscape.  Lovely first washes, perspective, detail and layout.

Tuesday 18 June - Beginners Watercolour

Our popular class, that covers paints, papers, brushes, it takes you right back to the beginning, great as a refresher class, or if you haven't painted with watercolour since school, or never at all! 

Claire teaches you in a calm, step by step style and you will complete a painting to take home with you.

Wednesday 19 June - Sunflowers in Tuscany

Sunshine and bright colours.  Interesting new techniques in watercolour, using a sword brush and glass balls (not to be missed!)

Tuesday 2 July - A Coastal Scene with Watercolour

Cornwall.  Using a new technique with texture and flat brushes, we will paint an exciting breezy Summer's day at the beach in St Ives.

Wednesday 3 July - A Coastal Scene with Watercolour

As above

All classes cost £70, and this includes all of your materials, a 2 course home-cooked lunch with a glass of wine, plus teas/coffees and freshly baked biscuits throughout the day.

The classes run from 9.30am until approximately 3-3.30pm

To book, please email or call Emily

click here for details

Mixed Media Class - 18 October

Claire ran a Mixed Media painting class today, using acrylic paints and pastels.

We started gently with an acrylic painting in the style of watercolour and then used the vibrant pastel colours to add vibrancy, texture and interest.

Here are some of Claire's beautiful pastels.

A top tip to clean your pastels afterwards is to shake them in a bowl of dry semolina, as shown below!

We will be running an Introduction to Pastels Class on

Thursday 14 February 2013.

Here are the lovely paintings from today:

Amazing Acrylics

We had an amazing day with Claire yesterday, learning about Acrylics.

It was a great group and we enjoyed gorgeous sunshine, bright inks and acrylic colours, a delicious lunch and worked ourselves very VERY hard, as the photos below will show you.

After wetting our paper, we used these vibrant inks either by dropping them on, or making them move around with the brush.  They make fantastic patterns.

The photo below, shows some of the group making a start on their base cover.

The theme we had today was flowers, either as a still life or an abstract form, so there were plenty of floral ideas and shapes to choose from.

Unlike Watercolour paper that absorbs water and colour very quickly, the inks just sit on the paper we used today, so they take a while to dry, you can see the shine on the one here.

Ideal for us to have a nice quick break in the sunshine whilst they dried! 

we all loved this so much and thought it a work of art just on it's own! 

After the base layer had dried, we covered it with school white PVA glue, scrunched up a large piece of tissue paper, then smoothed it out over the top of our painting, using a rolling pin to smooth out any large air bubbles.  It creates a wonderful textured surface for us to work on.

After it had dried, (more sun, more biscuits!) we re-wet the piece of paper and added yet more inks to create a second layer of depth and interest, without losing the lights and darks we had already created.

Then it was time to get to work with the acrylic paints and start creating our masterpieces!

Some people got VERY carried away and managed two or three, all different and when it came to our gallery at the end, the room was full of stunning, bright and beautiful acrylic paintings.

A fantastic day!

Here are ALL of today's painting from our very talented ladies

 (note: some had never painted acrylics before) 

if you click on the photo, it will enlarge the painting so that you can get a closer look

An Impressive Day!

Summer Term Watercolour dates will be published shortly