ARE YOU TIRED OF FEELING SCARED ABOUT PAINTING THE BODY? WOULD YOU LIKE TO LEARN A FREE, LOOSE APPROACH, THAT WILL GIVE YOU CONFIDENCE IN PAINTING FIGURES?
I truly love painting faces and figures and believe that they are the most wonderful way to express so much emotion. I also believe anyone can paint expressive figures. However, many people are afraid to attempt the figure because of preconceived fears of the need for structure, measuring, anatomy, proportion, accuracy and realism. In this class, I will show you a more freeing, loose approach to figure painting. This course is not about Photorealism or academic studies, rather an expressive, engaging, emotional and dare I say it..a FUN approach!
COURSE OBJECTIVES
By the end of this course students will have an understanding of the following concepts:
- Use gestural mark making and continuous line
- Paint with unconventional skin tones and bold colour combinations
- Discover how to find the shapes, planes and angles of the figure
- Combine painting and the drawn line, and not relying on outlines
- Explore hand studies, abstraction and distortion
- Learn the importance of negative space
- Understand lights and darks
- Build layers of colour, and create strong and unusual underpainting
- Create an emotional narrative
- Learn how figures interact
- Create a strong scale
- Work with texture
MORE ABOUT THIS COURSE
FLUID FIGURES is not a traditional or conventional approach to painting the body. In this class, we learn to break free from that need for realism. We will embrace the imperfections and find our own interpretation of the figure. We will not spend hours studying anatomical references, measuring, studying foreshortening or perspective. We will feel our way, use our senses, work intuitively and often very loosely to see where the paint wants to take us.
I work Big, Brushy, Loose and Painterly and I encourage all of these things. Fill the paper, fill the canvas, fill the page! Find your confidence to express yourself fully. Break the need for preciousness, it is not always about the finished piece. I encourage you to paint over old work, paint over previous exercises, just try again, and again, and again.
Curriculum
- 11 Sections
- 11 Lessons
- Lifetime
- Getting started1
- Lesson 1Our first lesson will be a short lesson that focuses on gestural painting, continuous line and mark making. We will use timed exercises to prove that a lot can be achieved in a very short time.1
- Lesson 2Lesson two will focus on refinement of gestural lines. We will also practice finding the fluidity and grace of the figure.1
- Lesson 3In lesson three we will learn to see lights and darks, and learn the importance of tonal values and negative space (and a lesson on just let what happens, happen!) This is a short study.1
- Lesson 4We will have another quick study on abstraction and distortion. We will learn to lose the lines, and not to worry about relying on outlines!1
- Lesson 5We will study unconventional skin tones, proving it doesn’t all need to be flesh coloured.1
- Lesson 6The main focus will be hands! Yes, hands! I know that drawing and painting hands can be daunting for so many. I will share with you some simple steps to creating expressive hands. These steps will give you some confidence.1
- Lesson 7We will paint several expressive hands! We will use what we have learnt about hands and take it to the next level.1
- Lesson 8We will now explore the idea of including more than one figure in our work, and how the figures interact with one another in a painting.1
- Lesson 9Now we will be experimenting with bold colors! A striking pose with a striking palette!1
- Lesson 10In our final lesson, we will be studying how to create an emotional message through texture, colour, and scale. We will create a piece with more than one figure, and several hands. All of the lessons up to this point will come together as we create this final, emotional, figurative piece!1
Requirements
- Large sheets of mixed media paper. The bigger the better.
- ‘chuck away’ paper for exercises wallpaper, brown paper, old work etc
- Black soft charcoal pencils
- Black Stabilo ‘marks all’ pencil
- White gesso
- Selection of flat edge brushes 1 ½inch, 1inch, ½ inch etc
- Acrylic paint- please use what you have.
- Black ink or acrylic
- Oil sticks, pigment sticks or oil pastels
- Variety of vibrant colours
- Water spray
- Kitchen roll
- Wet wipes
- Spatula/ credit card
- Large household brushes (the scruffier the better)
- Plasterer’s scraper
- Sponge
- Tissue paper
- Collage paper- I use old maps
- Stencils
- White household paint
- White craft glue
- Plaster of Paris or talc
Features
- Follow along videos
- Repeat the workshop as many times as you like
- Join private facebook group
Target audiences
- Any one that wants to learn a new form of art