Innehållsförteckning för September 2023 från Leisure Painter

If this month's issue has a theme, it's got to be colour, and especially the colours of the season. Linda Birch begins a look at life in her village with sketches and paintings in line and wash and watermixable oils that celebrate community life and the surrounding countryside over the summer months. You don't have to live in a picturesque village in the Pennines or a busy metropolis to find inspiration in capturing your surroundings. Look in the corners of your garden, the local park or down your street to find the next subject. If you're short on inspiration this year, why not take a leaf out of Linda's book and start a series of paintings or sketchbook entries that document a year in the life of your home town?…

Pastel pencils relaunched The popular Caran d'Ache pastel pencils from Jakar have been relaunched with a new natural plant-based binder. This binder is 100 per cent vegetal based, improving the quality of the leads and making the pastels vegan. In addition, it reduces the weakness of the leads by 20 per cent and improves the sharpening, without affecting the colour or quality of the colours. The pastel pencils are available in 84 assorted colours, individually priced at £4.50 each, and in boxes of 12 (£52.99); 20 (£84.99; 40 (£169.99); and 76 (£354.99) as well as a luxury wooden box with 84 colours (£465.99). For more information visit www.jakar.co.uk…

Highlights Bothwell Art Club The Bothwell Art Club's annual exhibition will once again take place during the village Scarecrow Festival, 16 and 17 September at the Parish Church Centre, Main Street, Bothwell G71 8EX. Open 10am to 5pm on Saturday and 11.30am to 5pm on Sunday. For more information see Bothwell Art Club on Facebook. Chandlers Ford Art Group The Chandlers Ford Art Group's summer exhibition coincides with the popular Hampshire Open Studio event, held in halls at the Chandlers Ford Methodist Church, from 19 to 28 August. Visit www.chandlersfordartgorup.com The Lawrence Art Society The Lawrence Art Society in Devizes is holding its annual exhibition at Devizes Town Hall, St John's Street, Devizes SN10 1BN, from 3 to 5 August. Open daily, from 9.30am to 5.30pm; closing at 4.30pm on final…

Learning objectives ■ How to produce strong compositions ■ Highlight the focal point ■ How to manipulate photographs to make successful paintings In the past three articles we have looked at diff erent ways to compose a painting using directional lines, letters of the alphabet, and thirds and rabatment. Each of these techniques uses lines to guide the viewer through the picture and to help us to place features in the best possible places. Now I want to help us to think about one more set of lines that are crucial in a composition but are often not thought about. These are the borders, the boundaries, the four straight lines that form the edges of the painting. These are as much a feature of a painting as the objects you…

FIFE J & G Innes Ltd 107 South Street, St Andrews, Fife KY16 9QW Tel: 01334 472174 Open: Mon to Sat 9am-5.15pm Sun 12.30 - 4.30pm www.jg-innes.co.uk Stockists of: Winsor & Newton, Daler-Rowney, Hahnemühle, Staedtler, Parker, Waterman, books, magazines, cards, games and a gallery. Upstairs @ J & G Innes Ltd GLOUCESTERSHIRE Cotswold Art Supplies Church Street, Stow on the Wold, Gloucestershire GL54 1BB Tel: 01451 830522 Open: Mon to Sat 9.15am-5.15pm www.cotswoldartsupplies.com Stockists of: Winsor & Newton, Daler-Rowney, Pro Arte, Unison pastels, Sennelier, Conté, Paperblanks, Reeves. Picture framing on site. Pegasus Art Shop Griffin Mill, London Road, Stroud, Gloucestershire GL5 2AZ Open: Mon to Sat 9am-5pm www.pegasusart.co.uk Stockists of: Williamsburg, Rembrandt, Old Holland, Cranfield paints, Cobra, Winsor & Newton, Daler-Rowney, Derwent, Daniel Smith, Schmincke, Caligo, Da Vinci, Pro Arte,…

Skies can make or break a landscape, and painting them with confidence, whether from photographs or en plein air, will take you to the next level. You don't always have to reach for the blues, says Julie Collins; think orange, green, pink and gold instead. From how to paint the effect of rain storms to colour mixing for a vibrant sunset, Julie's feature on painting summer skies is packed with colour-mixing advice. Tony White follows with his approach to painting loose, interesting clouds as well as discussing essential flat and gradated wash techniques. His final tip says it all about his approach: ‘Let it rip. Don't be timid. We're only painting!’ And finally, Winston Oh inspires us with his look at painting skies on days when we don't see the…

Art club challenges Most people, when a local magazine drops through their letterbox, redirect it straight into the recycling bin, because most of these freebies contain nothing but adverts, punctuated by the odd announcement, labelled ‘important’ (a sure sign it's not), telling us something about a change to bin collections or forthcoming roadworks. Occasionally, there may be a mildly interesting carbonara recipe or advice on how to stop slugs from munching their inexorable way through all the plants you've just paid an arm and a leg for, but generally it's a cheap alternative to sleeping pills. So, what to do when the next exhibition came round? Tadworth Art Group decided on a slightly different approach and sent out various pieces of copy to local magazines, titled: How many ‘Vote for…

LONDON ■ Bankside Gallery 48 Hopton Street SE1. 020 7928 7521 www.banksidegallery.com ‘Quentin Blake and Linda Kitson: Portraits, Playhouses and People’, until 23 July. ■ Dulwich Picture Gallery Gallery Road SE21. 020 8693 5254 www.dulwichpicturegallery.org.uk ‘Berthe Morisot: Shaping Impressionism’, until 10 September. ‘Rubens and Women’: a major exhibition of work by the Flemish artist, Peter Paul Rubens, 27 September to 28 January 2024. ■ Mall Galleries The Mall SW1. 020 7930 6844 www.mallgalleries.org.uk DSWF Wildlife Artist of the Year 2023, annual exhibition, 11 to 16 September. ■ National Gallery Trafalgar Square WC2. 020 7747 28 85 www.nationalgallery.org.uk ‘After Impressionism: Inventing Modern Art’, until 13 August. ‘Saint Francis of Assisi’, until 30 July. ‘Paula Rego: Crivelli's Garden’, 20 July to 29 October. ‘The Credit Suisse Exhibition: Frans Hals’, 30 September to…

Learning objectives ■ How to use the glazing method using oils ■ Setting up the model ■ Colours and tones for painting effective skin tones Faces have always fascinated me. I never forget a face and can see many, in my mind's eye, that I knew in my childhood; some that I knew as well as my own, others just a fleeting memory. I wonder at the unique quality of each face. I find myself wholly absorbed by the structures, the differing colours and textures of the skin, the imperfections which I rarely regard as blemishes, as I find them interesting. I look closely when I can, the broken capillaries, the redness of the chin perhaps, the different shades of brown and grey that might be tound in the shadows…

Learning objectives ■ Work with a restricted palette using split complementary colours ■ Complete several paintings using slight colour variations Working with colour is diffi cult. If you are new to painting in oils, there is a lot to take on, and you might feel like a circus performer spinning plates. You must think about tonal values, but also about colour temperature, and you must manage the rheology of the paint (how thick it is or how runny). Usually, however, as novice painters we worry most about colour and making our colours match what we see in nature, or in the photos that we want to copy. It is always useful to look at painters of the past and see what tips we can glean from them. If we are…

WWW.PAINTERS-ONLINE.CO.UK For Rachel Wood, she finds there's nothing she likes better than getting outside in the countryside and being inspired by the world around her. Here she shares her passion for the wonders of nature and all that it has taught her as she paints a glorious summer sunset. To see more of Rachel's work, post a comment or upload your own image, visit www.painters-online.co.uk ‘Summer Sunset (right) was painted on location in early summer. With sunsets and sunrises, you never quite know what you're going to get and I've learnt that it's often a matter of just going with it in an attempt to capture a moment. I don't try to ‘chase’ the sun on its descent to the horizon, as I've found that trying to keep up with…

It would be lovely to think of summer skies as endless expanses of perfect blue, but as we know the weather is very much more varied than that. However, this gives us huge scope for exploring summer skies in watercolour. Living by the sea, the sky will change many times just in one hour. Here, I will give several examples of how to modify your colours for summer skies. But please go outside or at least look from your window for many other possibilities for this great subject. It would be good to spend at least a full week working on skies, as there is enough to learn about this to warrant studying and painting it over a long time. There is something very satisfying about fi lling two thirds…

OPPORTUNITIES Wales Contemporary Artists from the UK and worldwide are invited to enter two-dimensional and three-dimensional works on any subject to Wales Contemporary. The Wales Contemporary 2023 exhibition will open at the Waterfront Gallery, Milford Haven, from 21 October to 20 December. The application deadline is Monday 21 August at 5pm. For more information and to enter go to https://new.artopps.co.uk Tadworth Art Group The Leisure Painter winner at the recent Tadworth Art Group's exhibition is Alison Powell for her striking coloured-pencil drawing of a barn owl (above right). She wins a year's free digital subscription to Leisure Painter magazine. Alison worked for many years as an art teacher, before leaving to bring up her four children, but in 2010 she picked up her paintbrushes again and says she hasn't looked…

The summer exhibition at the Laing Art Gallery in Newcastle upon Tyne features work from the Pre-Raphaelites to the British Impressionists and explores their differing approaches to depicting the natural world. Works by William Holman Hunt, John Ruskin, George Clausen, Henry La Thangue and Henry Scott Tuke will be shown alongside rural scenes by Laura Knight, Elizbeth Forbes and others, bringing the fresh air and sunshine into the gallery. Essence of Nature is at the Laing Art Gallery, New Bridge Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, until 14 October. For more information visit www.laingartgallery.org.uk…

Reproduce the feel of a quick and easy holiday sketch using a photograph, with Tony Underhill Learning objectives ■ Capture quick holiday sketches ■ Work out what's important and what isn't ■ Keep things simple Sketching on the move outdoors is one of my favourite things to do, all the more so when I'm on holiday and there are new places and scenes to capture everywhere. As well as the enjoyment of the sketching process itself, I love the freshness and in-the-moment feel of on-location sketches and the way they capture time and place far more evocatively than a quick photo ever could. With that in mind, this month's project is to use a photo from my recent Lake District holiday (below) as reference and indoor practice for an outdoor…

Learning objectives ■ Understand the importance of perspective ■ Draw perspective lines accurately ■ Transfer these skills to drawing transport topics You will need • Sketchbook or cartridge paper. • HB. 2B or 4B pencils • Ruler • Plastic model kits and/or die-cast toy vehicles When I teach my weekly art classes, there is another word, in addition to ellipses (see last month) that I can guarantee will always strike a note of fear: perspective. But is it really that scary? In short, no. For beginners, understanding perspective is easier than you think and it will help you solve the problem of why your drawings may not always look right. While it may be a nemesis for artists when drawing architectural topics, the same principles remain whether you are drawing…

Who doesn't love a good sky? Skies are a fundamental part of landscape painting and play a very important role in the overall success of a piece. Most of the time, the light and luminosity in a painting comes from how strongly the sky is painted: it can make or break a painting and can transform an otherwise boring scene into one that is strong and lively. The flat wash To have the flat wash technique in your repertoire is essential and it will always do its job for you as long as you paint it quickly and with confidence. It is a great way to establish the light and what kind of day and time of day you're dealing with. It is also a very good sky to choose…