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By BrushStrokes, on March 22nd, 2012
Experimenting with mixed media – and other things
Workshops with Elizabeth Haines 2012
Venue – Bryn Morris studio and barn
Fee £40 per day, £45 for the Feltmaking, to include materials. 10 – 4.30pm. Bring own lunch. Tea and coffee provided. 6-8 people.
These exciting workshops are designed both to hone drawing skills by learning to look in different ways, and to challenge and re-animate ways of using water-based paint media. We always start by drawing – with the left hand (if normally right handed), looking at the shapes in between objects (‘negative shapes’), taking a line for a walk, drawing with eyes shut, anything to both loosen up and refine habitual ways of seeing. We start with simple line, move on to tone and finally to colour. For the two printing workshops, these drawings are used as images for making prints.
Working from initial marks, the painted image is allowed to evolve, disintegrate and re-emerge, rather than having a particular idea or motif in mind from the outset. Through sabotaging our habitual ways of working we allow the subconscious to surprise us, and the medium itself to shine without being constrained by what the picture is ‘supposed to be’. We learn to watch the unpredictable image as it emerges, and to respond to it. By experimenting like this we can really free ourselves up, and these techniques can be incorporated later into any genre such as landscape, still life or figure painting. Watercolour and gouache can be used as a precursor to the mixed media, including collage, collograph and monoprint, where this same approach is still relevant.
If there are people who have already been to one of these workshops, and need to develop their previous work, or want to do something slightly different, then the programme can be adjusted to individual needs. The negative shape drawing is, however, an essential ‘warmer up’ to any kind of painting.
I’m again doing some ‘special interest’ workshops again, (see below) where we will start with drawing and then move on to a specific project. No previous experience is necessary.
NEW for this year are Feltmaking with Carolyn Young, and Monoprinting and Collograph, both of which I have been experimenting with over the winter.
Dates for 2012:
May Tuesday 15th Mixed media and COLLOGRAPH. Collographic plates are made by creating a low relief surface with all manner of materials – card, string, cork, natural fibres and materials. These are stuck onto card, varnished and then used as the printing plate.
May 31st Thursday Mixed media painting
June Saturday 16th Mixed media and MONOPRINT Monoprinting is one of the simplest and most effective printing techniques: ink up the plate and then draw on the back of the printing paper, which is placed face down onto the plate. A marvellous range of effects can be explored.
July Sunday 1st Watercolour Just transparent paint on white paper, but there is so much more to it than that. This most subtle of mediums requires above all a fluency achieved through constant practice, a mixture of panache and control. As last year, we look at some of the early masters, Turner, Girtin, Bonnington, as well as contemporary practitioners. The day includes simple colour mixing, washes, glazes, resists (masking fluid, wax etc.) – and using lots of water!
July Wendesday 18th FELTMAKING with Carolyn Young
Carolyn has exhibited with the Pembrokeshire Craft Makers and Newport Collective, and created privately commissioned pieces. In this workshop she will demonstrate basic felt making techniques, to be developed creatively. You will take at least two pieces home and all felt making equipment and materials will be provided. Please do bring along other art materials e.g. threads, silk chiffon, textile crayons or inks.
August 31st Friday Drawing Some perspective drawing. Developing the ‘negative shapes’ by observing cows, sheep, trees, or the plethora of interesting objects in the barn. 5 minute drawings and longer studies, using line and tone. Using different drawing implements. Discussing the differences between drawing and painting, and looking at master drawings, old and new. Some copying if you wish.
September Wednesday 12th COMPOSITION, including the use of collage. Composing a picture entails shape, proportion, interval, scale and the principles of composition remain the same whatever the subject. Collage allows us to move the elements around freely.
MATERIALS TO BRING Acrylic paints, brushes and coloured inks, (not too many different colours) as well as rubber ‘colour shapers’ (these can be bought from art shops) For drawing, good quality cartridge paper and SOFT pencils; for painting, offcuts of mounting card, coloured paper for gouache, canvas boards or canvases, and primed paper .White gouache for impasto; old kitchen pump sprays can be filled with diluted ink for interesting effects. For printmaking please bring sharp knife and usual paints and paper. To whet your appetite, a quick google search will reveal many sites about monoprints and collographs.
Please contact me if you need advice.
Elizabeth Haines 01437 532 498 or haines_studio@hotmail.com
By Elizabeth, on August 23rd, 2011
By BrushStrokes, on June 17th, 2011
Claudia Myatt said (http://www.claudiamyatt.co.uk/blog/)
” …a watercolour workshop with Elizabeth Haines, who has an inspirational studio in the Preseli hills, and a profound understanding of how art works. She is particularly good at getting students to try new ways of working, experiment and see where the painting wants to go. I had a thoroughly enjoyable day…………”
By BrushStrokes, on May 30th, 2011
These exciting workshops are designed both to hone drawing skills by learning to look in different ways, and to challenge and re-animate ways of using water-based paint media. We always start by drawing – with the left hand (if normally right handed), looking at the shapes in between objects (‘negative shapes’), taking a line for a walk, drawing with eyes shut, anything to both loosen up and refine habitual ways of seeing. We start with simple line, move on to tone and finally to colour.
Working from initial marks, the painted image is allowed to evolve, disintegrate and re-emerge, rather than having a particular idea or motif in mind from the outset. Through sabotaging our habitual ways of working we allow the subconscious to surprise us, and the medium to shine without being constrained by what the picture is ‘supposed to be’. We learn to watch the unpredictable image as it emerges, and to respond to it. By experimenting we can really free ourselves up, and the techniques so learnt can be incorporated later into any genre such as landscape, still life or figure painting. Watercolour and gouache can be used as a precursor to the mixed media, and collage and monoprint are also very effective.
If there are people who have already been to one of these workshops, and need to develop their previous work, or want to do something slightly different, then they are free to do so. The negative shape drawing is, however, an essential ‘warmer up’ to any kind of painting.
I’m also doing some ‘special interest’ workshops, (see below) where we will start with drawing and then move on to a specific project. No previous experience is necessary.
Venue – Bryn Morris studio and (newly re-furbished!) barn
Fee £40 per day, 10 – 4.30, bring own lunch. Tea and coffee provided. 6-8 people.
Dates for 2011:
May Tuesday 3rd Mixed media
May Saturday 14th Painting and music. Here we explore the connections between these two arts, a subject which formed the basis of my PhD. Listening to music in different keys and by different composers, attempting to express their individual characteristics in colour and form. Looking at the abstract qualities which these arts share, for example line, tone, colour, composition, modulation and texture.
June Wednesday 1st Mixed media
June Tuesday 14th Watercolour Just transparent paint on white paper, but there is so much more to it than that. (And there are already a million books on how to do it).
This most subtle of mediums requires above all a fluency achieved through constant practice, a mixture of panache and control. We study some of the early masters, Turner, Girtin, Bonnington, as well as contemporary practitioners. Simple colour mixing, washes, glazes, resists (masking fluid etc.).
July Saturday 2nd Mixed media
July Friday 15th Colour Experiments with complementary colours. Hue and saturation. Colour theory/ exercises based on Johannes Itten, (Bauhaus) Baudelaire and Goethe. Studying and analysing the colour in master paintings, especially those with limited colour schemes – Velasquez, Braque. ‘Decorative’ colour – Marc and Matisse.
July Friday 29th Mixed media
August Tuesday 16th Drawing Some perspective drawing. Developing the ‘negative shapes’ by observing cows, sheep, trees, or the plethora of interesting objects in the barn. 5 minute drawings and longer studies, using line and tone. How does drawing differ from painting?
September Friday 2nd Mixed media
September Tuesday 20th The two sides of the brain. Some years ago I was forced to use my left hand for painting. It was a revelation, proving to me that the right hemisphere does offer an entirely different way of thinking and working. We develop and build on the ‘ right brain drawing’ with which we always start the workshops, and also look at philosophical backgrounds to this idea, (Ornstein, Stevenson) as well as Betty Edwards’ well known book Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain.
October Wednesday 5th Mixed media
I could also do a 2- 3 day workshop during the summer: please get in touch if you are interested.
MATERIALS bring your acrylic paints and brushes and coloured inks, (not too many different colours) as well as ‘ rubber colour shapers’ (these can be bought from art shops) For drawing, good quality cartridge paper and SOFT pencils; for painting, offcuts of mounting card, (ask your framer) coloured paper for gouache, canvas boards or canvases, and primed paper (can be bought in pads). White gouache can be mixed with watercolour to make it opaque, and old kitchen pump sprays can be filled with diluted ink for interesting effects. Please contact me if you need advice.
Elizabeth Haines: 01437 532 498 or haines_studio@hotmail.com
By BrushStrokes, on May 26th, 2011
 It was a marvellous day: Seimon Morris played various chords and sequences which we listened to carefully, and then visualised in colour the character and intervals in each one; this included the unresolved dominant 7th at the end of Messiaen’s L’Ascension. (During this some swallows were chirping in the barn – wouldn’t Messiaen have loved that!)
12 versions of Tallis’ ordinal were played in different keys, and everyone wrote down what they thought was the character of each, having briefly discussed aspects of tonality, and then did a coloured image of their reaction to one of them; some amazing similarities here.
We visualised a journey through Bach’s strictly tonal 1st 2 part Invention, then listened to Birtwistle’s Imaginary Landscape and each did paintings which expressed their understanding of this very different journey. My friend the composer Erika Fox was here, she knows Birtwistle and loves his work, and gave us some salient insights into the music. Even people who never usually listen to contemporary music made a great effort to engage with it. Jim included the call of the cuckoo in one of his pictures.
We ended up with a home made version of Ligeti’s Poème Symphonique using some metronomes and various clocks, all ticking slightly at odds with each other.
I am very much hoping to do this again, and especially with children: there are still a lot of things we didn’t have time for – a 19th century Credo where the words are intoned on one note while a succession of chords play around it. (Seimon had suggested that this was like a single transparent colour moving against a changing landscape of other colours.) Also the contrasts in Vivaldi’s Concerto for Piccolo and basso continuo, Fratres by Arvo Pärt, and perhaps one of Schenker’s Graphic Analyses.
People really enjoyed the day, and came up with an amazing variety of individual responses.
Jim wrote:
From Bach to Birtwistle
“From fixed view, or familiar- to unexpected surprise
From sleep or habit
- to awake.
From sitting in one place
- to moving around.
Fragments – unrelated to each other
- seemingly.
Details, parts, seen on a background
- yet not seen as a whole.”
Thanks, Elizabeth- A brilliant day
Erika said
“I found it wonderfully liberating to try and express something in a (for me) new medium. I feel I have learnt something about spacing, colour and texture. Doing is not at all the same as observing. A cliché, but one needs reminding.”
Catherine
Such fun! Really interesting exercises. It makes you think again about art and music, and puts the fun back into it. I would love part 2!
More workshops at BrynMorris are coming.
 
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