Postcard #22: Arley Studios

Dear friends,

A few weeks ago I was in Arley for another Tom Shepherd 5-day course.

A person on the course, asked me with interest, why somebody like me (as in, a working artist) would pay to go on an art course?

They’d assumed because I was earning money from my art that I’d learned everything I needed to.

And I used to think like this too, I remember doing my A-levels, with a plan to go on to University and I couldn’t wait for the day when I’d learned everything I needed to, to earn a living, and then I could just relax and read Jilly Cooper novels in my spare time!

I explained this to them, along with the fact that I’d come on this retreat with some defined goals. As a working artist, I’ve tweaked, pivoted and U-turned the way I work more times than I care to remember. Actively learning new ways to work, trying different materials and accepting there is no ‘end’ is now a welcome part of my process. I think the main difference between now and school is I’m only learning new things in areas that excite me and bring me joy and as I work for myself, I can take time off to read a Jilly Cooper anytime I like!

I’ve found that art retreats are a great way to give yourself ‘Permission to Paint’, it’s why I particularly like residential courses, your food is all arranged, there’s no cooking, cleaning, washing up to do, there are no distractions, you are free to focus on sketching/drawing/painting , usually they are hosted in picturesque and inspiring locations and because you’ve paid to be there, you’d better make the most of it!

Painting pet portraits as part of my business has it’s own set of boundaries, backgrounds are minimal or non-existent, they can’t be too distracting, I sometimes find the watercolour paper texture is background enough, the main focus is always the pet itself, I have a set colour palette I return to for most portraits and generally speaking (there’s always the odd exception) I’m painting heads and shoulders.

I had three distinct breakthroughs which I thought I would share with with you

1. Paint consistencies, I always joke that I’m a bit of a slow learner and I would say it has taken me three watercolour art retreats with Tom to get my paint consistencies and trust in myself to a better level, this is really quite key when it comes to watercolour and I work in my own way a lot of the time when painting a portrait, often adding more water in, breaking a lot of the ‘rules’ and actively pushing for ‘happy accidents’. This works well for me in the context of my work but not so well with the new compositional storytelling painting that I’m wanting to achieve. It’s been a case of ignoring/un-learning what I do now, learning and practising a different way and now I can combine the two.

2. Planning a painting and sitting in discomfort during the ugly stage! Tom talked a lot about trusting the process and as a group we were all familiar with the ugly stage of a painting and I think any artist will agree you get to a point where you believe the painting that you’re working on should be ripped up and put in the bin, it’s awful! Usually I’m too impatient to plan out a painting but this time I really embraced the process from planning composition, tonal sketches to colour studies and I found planning out the painting really helped me this time, I knew the ugly stage would come and I was able to sit with it and not focus on it. Planning also helped me reduce/eliminate those impulsive decisions that would inevitably ruin the painting in one brush stroke.

   

3. Storytelling. There’s an element of storytelling in all of my work from my greeting card illustrations to my pet portraits and whilst on past art retreats I generally just painted anything and everything from landscapes to wild animals to doorways, these are all great and obviously I’ll continue to paint whatever catches my eye. But, as I said, another specific goal of mine was to paint some more compositional paintings. All of these paintings are from reference images, I have my own collection, I try and use my own photographs where possible or from free stock image sites, Tom had a great collection for us to use and then finally I found some on i-stock that really inspired me and I bought a license to use them. I think these final two paintings are the ones I was most happy with from the whole week of painting

These were the main things I came away with from this particular course, but there was a lot more too, there were some new friends made and old friends returning. I found a bit more freedom in going up a brush size which was surprising to me, I bought a new brush (who can resist the lure of some new art supplies?), endless tips and tricks that were so welcome yet completely unexpected. Someone shared a video on mounting your watercolours onto board and sealing with cold wax, which I know I’m going to try,

and so on, when you get a group of artists together, we like to share!

This was the ‘Expressive Watercolours’ course and you can view other courses run by Tom here. None of these are affiliate links, I just really enjoy his teaching style and I like his painting style.

So when it comes to picking your own art tutor these are the things I was looking for, ideally either residential or away from home so I’m eating out and domestic life doesn’t interrupt too much, just a focus on art, I don’t want a yoga session or a wine-tasting, that’s wasting good painting time in my book!, and an artist whose work I admire greatly but perhaps don’t want to paint exactly like, the main thing I love about Tom’s work is the ‘life’ in it, the energy and the immediacy that I think is wonderful with watercolour and what I would like to achieve more of in my work, whereas a lot of the colours he uses are far brighter than I would normally use and the subject matter is different to what I’m sometimes drawn to. To me, this is a perfect mix.

I must also give a big shout out to the venue which is Plum & Olive Studios if you happen to be local to the area, or it’s in travelling distance, they run a whole series of courses by many talented artists (link below) and lastly for me, what’s next is I’ll be opening up my cupboard of a studio from July 4 to July 12 in the Forest of Dean. This is just after we get back from a longer trip to Mongolia so watch this space for my upcoming postcards on that adventure!

My last postcard about Arley itself:

Postcard #21: Arley

Tom Shepherd School of Watercolour -

https://schoolofwatercolour.co.uk/

Arley Studios/ Olive & Plum Art Academy - https://www.oliveandplumretreats.com/art-academy

Far Open Art Trail - 4-12 July (I’m Studio 25 on the trail)

https://faropen.co.uk

PS At the time of publication, Tom is running a studio sale of his work, @tomshepherdartist on IG or get on his email list AND I also forgot to mention, he was kind enough to be a guest on my interview series here…