Autumnal Abstracts

The landscape is not a static subject. It moves and flows. Trees rustle and clouds fly by, forever changing and charged with beautiful, raw energy.

In this 3-day abstract landscape workshop, you will learn how to respond as an artist to this energy and infuse your landscape painting with vitality and life. Drawing inspiration from the Yorkshire landscape, we will start with fast, gestural observational drawing, moving away from the traditional horizon line and instead, seeing the landscape as overlapping and interconnected layers. Your mark making will become more spontaneous and playful as we simplify forms such as trees, fields, flowers, and rocks down to simple, dynamic marks, which will inform more abstract ways of seeing.

The transition from drawing to painting will occur using inks on paper. Inks are a versatile medium, ranging from soft and delicate when diluted to bold and intense when used neat. We will work outdoors, playing with inks and pastels to create a collection of color studies aiming to capture a sense of place. These studies, combined with our drawings, will provide the inspiration for mixed media abstracts back in the studio.

On the final day I will introduce acrylic paint, as we explore working with additional mediums which will add a third dimension to our paintings. I will also demonstrate how you can use all your observational work to inspire and create final finished paintings on paper away from the landscape.

This workshop will combine plein air work on location and also studio-based time. participants will need to be comfortable walking a maximum of 20 minutes to locations. Walking shoes/boots will be essential.

Lunches and refreshments included.
Days run from 10am to 4pm (ish)

My Inspiration

I create my art primarily on large sheets of paper, capturing colours and marks in the landscape to produce abstract representations of wild and open places. These places evoke a sense of awe and freedom in me, particularly when I am on a remote beach in the Hebrides or the vast open plains of Dartmoor. It's this profound emotion and energy that I aim to convey in my paintings. I use inks, pastels, and acrylics to work swiftly, creating instinctive marks that hint at the various elements that define the unique character of a place, such as wild flowers, open moorland, or distant rock formations. Each place possesses its own distinct features.

Through my workshops, I strive to introduce artists to my unique perspective on landscape art, with the hope of inspiring them to discover their own abstract language.