Image and Word

A must see exhibition at a must visit venue - Monnow Valley Arts Middle Hunt House, Walterstone, Herefordshire HR2 0DY (h.art venue 10). Superb views, four acres of garden complete with sculptures and carved lettering. The Image and Word exhibition features 50 prints and limited edition prints from the Julian Francis Collection of Prints and Private Press Books. Additional prints and books are available for sale, including prints by Eric Gill, David Jones and John Buckland Wright.

the most comprehensive exhibition of 20th and 21st century wood engraving I've ever seen

Trudy Friend

Trudy Friend gave us a wonderful demonstration yesterday and our new projector gave everyone a clear view of her eight basic strokes for drawing and painting. She worked rapidly to produce a variety of drawings that made use of these strokes and gave a clear running commentary on what she was doing. Very impressive stuff.

If you want to find out more about Trudy and her books and DVDs then visit her website www.trudyfriend.co.uk This also has some YouTube video clips so you can watch her work. Here's one of them:

Trudy worked into one of drawings with a water brush - something many of us had not seen before. The Pentel water brushes are available from www.saa.co.uk

Painting Holidays

Have you ever been on a painting holiday? It would be great if members could use this blog to share something of their experiences pass on any recommendations for others. Brian Steventon has sent information about a painting holiday he will be leading to Cinque Terre, Italy. The area certainly looks very colourful.

You will be able to see additional information on the Authentic adventures website : http://www.authenticadventures.co.uk/painting-holidays/italy/cinque-terre.aspx There's also a trip to Sardinia on 29 June.

Glass Festival



Market stall in 2008


The International Festival of Glass is celebrating 50 years of international studio glass and 400 years of glass making in Stourbridge. It runs from 24-27 August at 8 venues. The main festival site is the Ruskin Glass Centre & Glasshouse Arts Centre - home to an array of glass and craft studios and location of the British Glass Biennale. See www.ifg.org.uk for more detail.


I thoroughly enjoyed the festival when I visited in 2008 and look forward to another good day out. The Bead Fair at the Bonded Warehouse, Canal Street is full of life and colour. Broadfield House Glass Museum has one of the best glass collections in the world and well worth a visit at any time. Unfortunately redevelopment in Stourbridge town centre means no open air stalls for glass makers to sell their wonderful creations.

Even if you are not as enthusiastic about glass as I am, a visit to the Festival will give masses of inspiration for your paintings.

Portraits in Oil

I'm told there are 3 spaces left for the 2 day Introduction to Portraiture and Oils workshop run by Mike Skidmore on August 11th & 12th 2012. 

 The cost of the 2 day workshop is £150 and if you go to Mike's website www.mikeskidmoreonline.com you can find out more about the man himself and his workshops. The link for the 2 day workshop is http://www.mikeskidmoreonline.com/new-to-portraits-in-oils.html

 I would value comments from members about advertising activities like this. I don't want to crowd the blog with adverts but it some might find it useful to know what is going on not too far from Ledbury

Art in Action

A fine day but soggy underfoot, muddy in a few places and there were lots of sensible people wearing wellies or walking boots. But what a range of art work! I expected to enjoy the paintings and the glass, and was not disappointed, but the ceramics were far beyond expectation - some really great pieces.

Patrick Cullen

Art in Action really gives some idea of how many talented people can express themselves through their art or craft skills. And I guess many of the visitors also had some skills and talents. I'm always impressed by those prepared to demonstrate their talents in public and enjoyed watching artists work. The one that impressed most was Patrick Cullen, who was demonstrating portrait painting with pastels. Fascinating to see how he builds up the image. He must have to constantly make decisions about what colour and placement of his marks yet he seemed to work without hesitation. His self-portrait in the Best of the Best exhibition was superb and he also had some excellent landscapes on show in the painting tent.

The Market Place was almost too much - so much to see and enjoy- and then the big range of art materials. I was so tempted by the range of brushes, many on offer at reduced prices, and paper I can always use. Did I give in to temptation? No. I always want to buy more things to feed the art dream but what I need to do is make art with the materials I already have. I need to do rather than fantasise. So I came away with nothing but a sense of enjoyment and a lot of inspiration.

The Old Curiosity Shop

The Dickens themed painting challenge begins with The Old Curiosity Shop. Art work should be presented unframed at the meeting on Tuesday September 4th.

What a challenge this is! Do you go for scenes from the book or show a shop front or interior? As always the theme can be loosely interpreted so perhaps a visit to an antique shop might inspire. A local source of ideas might be the some of the objects in the Butcher Row Museum. The temptation will be to put too much in or try to be too detailed. Perhaps an unusual still life is called for.

Dickens used wood engravings to illustrate his novel and brought together a team to produce the illustrations. You can see images of the original illustrations at http://charlesdickenspage.com/illustrations-curiosity_shop.html  Phiz contributed most of the designs for the plates and George Cattermole contributed fourteen drawings.  Cattermole was a great friend of Dickens and his studio was probably the inspiration for the novel. He produced many historical paintings and his studio was full of curiosities and props including a suit of armor.

I wonder where members will find their inspiration.