Tag: Art-lessons

A Better Style

Organisational Aesthetics

My last post of 2023. This balances out the product showcase post on Sunday 17th.

I went on an interior styling intensive course at Chelsea College of Art and Design. It strangely felt like revisiting my old employer twice. Once because I was previously course director of a MA programme at UAL and second because I worked for the Tate one summer in the membership department at the Tate Britain (Millbank) site in the 1990’s. My work at Tate Britain meant that I then went on to do my arts management dissertation comparing Tate and Art institute of Chicago’s membership strategies. Ahh, those were the days. Sorry I digress.

Anyway, last week, the tutor for my interior styling was the amazing Emma who took us through the practical steps of being one of those people who set up the shots for glossy interiors magazines as well as the communication collateral for big brands.

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Abstract Saturday/ Sunday

Behind the Scenes

Below is a collection of paintings and initial drawings I did at the City Lit Abstract Painting Weekend Course. It was fun. There were lots of other painters there.

Some of us ate at Itsu Covent Garden on the pavement at lunch and watched as the Free Masons tried to recruit more members from people (men walking by. Our lunchtime vista was a strange mixture of men wearing dark Crombie coats, hell’s Angels, and a couple of Harley-Davidsons on the pavement.

Perhaps that inspired me to create this really feminine piece of work below. Some of the feedback in the crit was that I have a really light hand. I felt light creating it, so that was nice to hear.

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Why Painting Julian Opie Simplicity is Quite Hard

Behind the Scenes, Personal Reflections

Our teacher took us through some portraits this week in my art class. The usual classics were there for us to study composition, tone, paint strokes etc. But I was struck by how much I was drawn into Julian Opie’s work.


I’d never seen his work before, and I noticed how my eyes were pulled into pattern finding.


However, I took on the challenge of seeing what my marks and finish might be like if I painted in the style of Julian Opie. I initially thought it might be easy; perhaps I was being lazy, but when I realised the attention to detail demanded in getting the contrasting tones right. Another hurdle I had to surmount was the light and the dark shapes to make sure those correctly gave the impression of light and shade. I discovered in class that trying to do this using oil colour is another difficulty because Julian Opie probably uses acrylics. But never mind, it’s all practice.

Making my life difficult wit oil on canvas board

Mixing the shades and tones

Urban winter sunrise inspires blue & yellow landscape in oil

London Culture & Places

This week I started a landscape. It was based on one of my popular IG posts where we had a spectacular sunrise in London on Monday. From the images below it is clear to see that I am not a photo realist. There is a touch of impressionism, pop art and fantastical influences in my marks. It reminds me of the comical quality of British painter Beryl Cook.

Three-dimensional effect oil painting

Behind the Scenes

This week I joined my oil painting class. It was interesting to join an art class online. We use Padlet to share our work after taking pictures using our phones.
I rather enjoyed experimenting with the different tones of yellow that could be seen and how the shade of the fruit was reflected in some of the shadows, and it was important to convey that in the paintings.
What surprised me was how long it took for the oil paint to dry. But I’m learning how oil painters appreciate the wetness so that you can keep returning and doing this magical chemistry work with the paint.

I noticed the magic as I became mesmerised by the texture, getting colours blended to do the highlights. I was chuffed with the teacher’s comment that she noticed a great 3D effect in my work.