All Is Happily Busy in Class

I felt like a "real" teacher ... one of my students brought me roses from her garden!

And here is Nancy [of the roses fame] with one of her latest works.

Mark and Melanie [husband and wife who were curious about watercolor] very intent on their work.

Mark has had some art experience with acrylics, and is having a blast finding out what watercolor can do. And Melanie is fascinated with it. Yay!! ... converts! 

Ann always has her own floral projects.

I wanted to demonstrate the poured watercolor technique.  I also had a craving to paint some more geese. So I got this ready ...

 ... did the first pour in class, and took it home to work on it. I had no idea where it was going from here.

Thank you so much for dropping by! 

Back to the Classroom

This was the new class last Saturday - a very enthusiastic group!
I asked if anyone minded if I took pictures for my blog. All said it was fine, with the stipulation that they could see the blog post. 

Pondering the next step ...

Getting into some wet-in-wet ...

A lot of washes and masking to start my next painting. First the duck was masked, then I did a flat wash over all the background, followed by several gradated washes of permanent rose, quin. burnt orange and indanthrone. Then I masked out the pattern, and painted two washes - a dark violet and a black mixture. This photo is after all the washes with the masking just removed.

This is actually more like the color in real life. Starting the feet and bill now, with w/w washes of aureolin and quin. sienna. This will be called Arabesque, after the ballet posture as well as the design pattern.

Thank you very much for dropping by!

Who Would Have Thought ... Teaching Painting

An overview of the classroom and most of the class
The sessions are held at a new center in Surrey that opened just last May - the South Surrey Recreation and Arts Center.

A happy and proud student

Another very pleased student

Working on their own projects

Finishing up the background

Pondering the next step

All styles ...

... and colors

An ambitious project - painting her cat on some colorful blankets

These are some photos of the class I taught last Saturday. I asked the students if they minded if I took some photos, and posted them in my blog, and  all said it was fine.

I am still amazed at how much I love teaching. I find it so inspiring and challenging in a very good way. And I love the interchange of ideas. I am teaching in a very loose format - most of the class has an idea of a project on which they want to work.  At the previous class, one of the students stated that she would appreciate more demonstrations at the beginning of the class. So, as we go along, I have and develop new ideas and projects. To start with, I do a demonstration, and then they are off! I'll walk around the classroom, seeing if anyone needs help, answering questions, maybe doing some more demos ... Two hours flies by in no time! At the end of class, I'll ask if there is any particular project they would like to take on the next time, so I could go home and prepare a lesson. Thats' it - very flexible and open.

Last week, I was having a fascinating chat with one of the students, and the conversation evolved into a demo of creating a work using masking tape. The entire class was very interested in the idea, so next week, it's "batik" watercolor. I read Sandy Maudlin's excellent blog, so I have gone back to it to get some information on that particular process of painting.

Initially, I kept the class size to eight students, which was all I felt I could manage as a novice instructor. But the class has become very popular, and my confidence has increased, so next week there will be ten students. I can hardly wait!!!

Thank you so much for dropping by!