Seeker

I was surprised and pleased yesterday to be awarded a prize following the art school exhibitions in August .  No I was not the winner - no surprises there. But I was presented with the award ( a bottle of bubbly) for 'the best progress in this class'. This was a great encouragement to me to persevere with learning to paint with watercolours. Then someone I know commented, "I suppose a best progress prize shows just how far you had to go from your start - it could mean from bottom of the class to 3rd from bottom". He's right of course, but I will not be deterred from trying a bit longer. As I've previously blogged, I do have a good tutor in Linda Travers Smith . In any case I don't see an art class as a competitive situation. We learn from and encourage each other. However I do enjoy competing with myself and trying to get better - if only I had more time to practice. I mage Credit: Pixabay, CC License

Back in May I started this blog because I like learning new skills. I managed a few summer posts and then lapsed into silence, except for commenting on other people's blogs. I clearly haven't yet learned how to incorporate regular blogging into my lifestyle. This photo of a poppy in my garden was taken about the time of my last blog. It's not very seasonal for the UK today, but I include it to brighten things up now that our summer seems to have gone. My last post 'Painting Sand Dunes' was about my attempts at watercolour painting. Since then I managed to exhibit 2 paintings (including poppies) among others from my class in a student exhibition in August. I was hugely encouraged by comments of people who visited the exhibition. I know I've made progress and that's all down to practice and a good teacher. I'm going to try to blog more often this autumn. I've noticed a few other bloggers like me who start with good intentions but don't kee...

I was full of hopeful expectation. This time I would create a painting I wouldn't be too ashamed to show in the art class exhibition in August. I love wet-in-wet watercolour landscapes, so was pleased that was what we worked on in the "Watercolour Improvers" class this week. I started with a photo like this, by Iain Macaulay taken in 2007 at St Fergus Links, Aberdeenshire. I assembled my watercolours for a wet-in-wet painting. I liberally soaked the paper in clean water as instructed by my tutor. I tentatively dropped in phthalo blue, raw sienna, raw umber to create my interpretation of sky, sea, sand dunes and grasses. The lesson was about moving the paint around the paper while still wet, learning both to control and go with the flow. The tutor had made it look so easy in her demonstration. I was so disappointed with my efforts. The tutor took pity on my cry of 'this isn't working' and with my permission picked up my biggest brush and continued ...