Queensland Painting and Illustration Workshops in Watercolour
Ive just stepped back in the studio door, returning from my weeks painting workshops on the beautiful Gold Coast, QLD. Aside from all the wonderful events and interactions over the week… How lovely to fly north for the winter! Its a beautiful winters day here in Sydney, but brrrr…. its definitely chilly. My dog is asleep at my feet once more, snuggled into his tiny bed like a acorn in its cap, the firewood is stacked ready for the night ahead and although QLD is in my blood and heart, it feels good to be home too. Certainly, it feels extra good after such a happy, positive and successful week painting with you all.
The weather was gold, the students were gold, and their efforts and work get gold stars all round! Hosted by Artable Studio once more, we settled in to the wonderful venue space wed call our studio for the week, exploring BUTTERFLY ILLUSTRATION for the first 2 days, before moving on to an additional 3 days on FROG ILLUSTRATION. Two of my favourite natural history painting subjects, these were our focus for the week. There was much to learn. Some students coming to the event completely new to painting, but no surprise to me, my students rise to every single and very real challenge to make incredible progress, achieve some really solid learning, and create truly stunning results… each and every one of them. So proud.
2 Day BUTTERFLY ILLUSTRATION Workshop event on the Gold Coast
To create Natural History illustrations well is no easy feat and the goal of doing it better never ends which is so much of what I love about it! We start and we learn. We do it, then we do it better… then we do it better, and better again. We learn more, we achieve more and our work improves with every single effort. It doesnt come for nothing, its a craft that requires effort, and of course with effort comes achievement and the sort of deep sense of self satisfaction so much of the world has forgotten the value of these days. My students jumped in with gusto and stayed in that positive space from start to end and their efforts certainly showed.
Of course it wasnt all work and no play! We had such a lovely time together, making new friendships and connections along the way which is always such a lovely part of these events…. And of course, we even had cake 👏🏻😁
FROG ILLUSTRATIONS from the 3 Day painting workshop
There were so many beautiful paintings its hard to even convey that here, but this is a little gathering of the frog illustrations we produced over the 3 days. The first study was an incredible Poison Dart Frog captured by my friend Kathy Raffel who kindly offered us the use of her image to knowledge share in our painting workshop. We had such a wonderful time learning more about this incredible creature and how to capture it in watercolour. The second focus was the adorable Green and Golden Bell Frog which was generously offered to us by Matt Clancy, another wonderful photographer so check out his profile on social media too if you can. His Instagram handle is @clancy_wildlife or take a peek at his work on Flickr
So, we covered a lot of ground over the 5 days painting together, learning, painting, laughing, catching up with others, and for me and my Melbourne students, enjoying the warmer weather of the north! Thanks again to everyone who made this event possible and wonderful, wonderful family, friends, my beautiful children, Artable Studio of course, my amazing helpers and my talented students, it was an excellent experience and ill be back again soon enough to paint with you again!
For now that brings me, and us to the end of my 2023s workshop and painting events calendar, as far as confirmed events in any case. I may add more, but we shall see. For now thats a wrap! Keep an eye out on my social media profiles for any new watercolour and natural history painting and workshop opportunities, ask Artable, or Bienarté to be popped on their notifications list for any new openings that may come up, or reach out to me anytime to ask. We appreciate expressions of interest so let us know your thoughts and Ill see you before you know it 🙏🏻