Mike Skidmore demonstrates portrait painting

Mike gave us fascinating insights into his techniques and his life story. After three years at art school, he gave up painting for 15 years!

Usually Mike paints his portraits using traditional oil techniques. For this demonstration he took advantage of the quicker drying times of acrylic before switching to oil glazes in the later stages.

The portrait was based on a monochrome photograph - subject unknown but obviously with some depth of character which Mike likes to portray with realism.

His drawing with 2B pencil had been done in advance (about an hour of work) and washed over thinly with Payne's Gray acrylic paint. This seals the drawing and provides a base for the underpainting also done in Payne's Gray of varying intensity.

You can see more about Mike's technique on his website  http://www.mikeskidmoreonline.com/

Underpainting in Payne's Gray 

The painting after glazes with acrylic and oil

Looking forward

We're looking forward to the start of our Autumn and Winter programme on 2nd September when we have Mike Skidmore demonstrating how to paint portraits using acrylics. You may remember Mike was due to come to us in February but was unfortunately taken ill.

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For the full programme of demonstrations see the Autumn and Winter programme page

The Trumpet calls

Two LAS members, Ian & Anne Cook, are exhibiting some of their paintings and cards at the Trumpet Crossroads studio from July 2nd to August 31st2014 10;00am – 4:00pm

If you chance upon the right day you might find Ian at work on a new painting.

The studio is located 4 miles from Ledbury at the intersection of the A438 and the A417/A4172 next to Trumpet Garage – postcode HR8 2RA











More pictures follow

Exhibition 2014

Ledbury Art Society's annual three day exhibition opened to the public this morning (Saturday 24 May). We have fewer paintings on show this year but the quality is high. The good thing about having only 90 paintings is they can be displayed to advantage more readily. To give a quick impression of what's on show I took some photos while we were in the process of setting up. That's why some of the labels are not on the boards. When you visit you will also see that many paintings were repositioned. Hanging is a bit like doing a jigsaw puzzle and finding, when you get to the last few pieces, that some you had already fitted in are not actually in the right place.

Postcard Art Auction

The following may be of interest to LAS members

Nigel Street - Aspire Watercolourist of the Year

Great news for LAS member Nigel Street. He's been named Aspire's Watercolourist of the Year.

Robin Holder - River Severn in Oils

We are very grateful to Robin Holder for stepping in at only a few hours notice to do this demonstration after Mike Skidmore was taken ill. When Robin came to us in February of the previous year he had used watercolour to paint the Severn at Kempsey. This time it was the Severn in Worcester showing the old Rowing Club boathouse behind the racecourse at Pitchcroft. You may have guessed that most of Robin's landscape work features the Severn. He does very little studio work and much prefers to get out in all winds and weathers ... and he's prepared to stand in flood waters while painting! I just hope he's been careful about where he stands in the last couple of weeks as the Severn reached record levels coming slightly higher at Barbourne than it did in 2007.

The demonstration painting was based on a painting that Mike had done a few weeks before. That had the sun coming from the left but for the demonstration he's repositioned it. Even in winter the sun would be higher in the sky when looking south but artists are allowed licence and this painting contre jour allows interesting light to play on the water. The photographs I took were so poor this time that I only include one here and that doesn't show the colour achieved. However, even with the original the tones did suggest moon rather than sunlight.

Do take a look at his website http://www.robinholder.co.uk/ to see more of what he does and find out about the tuition he offers.