Thursday 12 January, with Elaine

Elaine brought a multitude of items for her still life set up, all seemingly related to the theme of a picnic at the seaside, and providing lots of different colours, shapes and textures.  A real challenge to sort out a picture to paint or draw.  

​At the other end of the room, Elaine offered herself as the model in an interesting pose, resulting in  some very good portraits.

First, some of the still life drawings.  The first is from Liz, who has used acrylic inks very effectively for her painting.  In the second picture, Sally P has been very selective in choosing very few items;  she has  used watercolour pencils for her painting and says it was fun to do as she hasn't used them for months.  Next, Noreen has used two or three different pens to try and depict the tones and textures of a portion of the set up; a lot more time and effort would be needed to complete this.  In the fourth picture, Jackie has used watercolour, and remarks on the intense concentration in the room on the very varied still life and on our model, Elaine.  Next, Lesley says this is as far as she got with the picnic, using mostly pen but also a water soluble graphite pencil for shading; quite a challenge, she says, but she enjoyed the mark making.

Here are some of the portraits of Elaine, starting with Sally P's which is in charcoal; she says she is pleased withe the angle of the head, but doesn't feel she has got a likeness.  The next three are Avril's, drawn bigger than usual (well done) and using pastels. The fifth one is Angela's of Elaine this week.

Angela has also sent in two portraits from last week, of Linda, and a 'tonal underpainting' of Elaine, which she may or may not develop further.  We await any further developments with interest.

Eileen worked on her own project today, from a photo of trees with sunshine behind.  She is in the progress of mixing and applying one colour at a time.  Again, we'll be interested in seeing the final picture.

Diana refers to her painting last week of fennel in a glass jar from a recent magazine picture.  She decided to add amaryllis from photo she took in 2016 - which included in the background her painting of fennel seed heads which she sold back then..... 

.... a spooky coincidence she says. And finally, "Don't ever let anyone tell you that you can't change a watercolour.

Frances couldn't make it to EAG today but has sent some sketches from the week. First, three sketches done at a Life Class at Diss Cornhall on Monday and second sketch done standing at Betty’s Fen Thelnetham in rather chilly conditions last Friday afternoon.
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Carolyn, also not present, has sent two pictures, including flowers and a bookcase, having experimented with different methods of sending them.  (Hope I've chosen the best ones! Noreen)

Before closing, Lesley has asked me to remind everyone that Frances is doing a Theme morning on Composition next week and that the requirements are on the website - see Stop Press. So no model or still life. 
Hannah will be doing the blog, so please send your work to her on the 19th.  Meanwhile, have a good week and keep sketching.  Noreen.