Artists & Illustrators September 2022

THE FAVOURITE MAGAZINE FOR ARTISTS

09

SEPTEMBER 2022 • £5.25 9 770269 469214

T I P S • T E C H N I Q U E S • I D E A S • I N S P I R AT I O N

Coloured pencils Draw portraits, pets and more!

WIN!

£1,000 worth of Derwent Lightfast coloured pencils

Capture a dramatic landscape Great advice from the pros

Mastering animal fur In watercolour and mixed media

Jim Moir

Meet the artist best known as

VIC REEVES

How to... IMPROVE YOUR PAINTING • WORK WITH A LIMITED COLOUR PALETTE

Contents A R T I S T S & I L LU S T R AT OR S • S E P T E M BE R 2022

Regulars

5 SKETCHBOOK Quick tips, ideas and inspiration. Plus, this month’s exhibitions 12 PRIZE DR AW Win £1,000 of Derwent’s revolutionary Lightfast Pencils

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28 WE PRESENT... Portfolio Plus member Robert Mee 79 YOU TELL US Write in and win a £50 Atlantis art voucher 82 PICTURE THIS Bella Martineau tells us the story behind her painting

Inspiration 14 IN THE STUDIO Tamsin Dearing captures wrinkles and laugh lines in her Cornish studio 22 HOW I PAINT Rory Hancock reveals how his work is constantly evolving 30 THE BIG INTERVIEW Portraits for NHS Heros artist Tom Croft on capturing portraits 36 BOOK EXTR ACT Inspiration from BIRDS: Paintings of 100 British Birds by Jim Moir 42 EXHIBITIONS RA introduces American painter Milton Avery’s work to a British audience 48 RETROSPECTIVE Adebanji Alade tells us about five significant paintings in his life

Techniques 40 GUEST EXPERT Jurga Vilimaite shares her top tips for watercolour painting 52 IN - DEPTH Jake Spicer first article of five in drawing with coloured pencils

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58 SERIES The last landscape guide from Ann Witheridge 62 MASTERCL ASS Follow Penel Kirk as she paints a mountain hare in mixed media 68 STEP BY STEP Matthew Haydn Jeanes shows his techniques for painting a dog in watercolour 72 HOW TO Gregory Mason captures a dramatic Maldives seascape in oil

42 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 3

E DITOR' S L ET TER

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THIS MONTH’S COVER ARTWORK

By Tamsin Dearing

There is so much to celebrate… …about being part of the thriving art world and the September issue of Artists & Illustrators showcases many of them, whether we are introducing you to professional artists and their paintings or giving advice on how to improve your own artwork.

As he turns 50, Adebanji Alade, The One Show’s Artist in Residence, shares with us five significant paintings of his career to date. We also catch up with Tom Croft, the artist behind the Portraits for the NHS Heroes movement. He talks about his love of painting portraits whilst showing us his rather unusual paint palette; I don’t think you will have seen one like it!

We also speak to two very different, yet equally talented, artists about their art practise. Rory Hancock works with oils to create his realist artwork inspired by fashion magazines and editorials.

Meanwhile, cover artist Tamsin Dearing is hooked on drawing portraits of people and animals in graphite, soft pastel and coloured pencil.

Jake Spicer is back with an informative five-part coloured pencil series where he makes use of Derwent’s revolutionary Lightfast coloured pencils. I’m pleased to reveal that you – and three other readers – can win one of their 72 pencil tin sets in this month’s prize draw. Then, Penel Kirk shows you how to paint an endangered brown hare in mixed media but if you’re after something with a little more drama, Greg Mason shows you how he captured a moody Maldives seascape in oils.

In this huge array of work, featuring many different subjects and mediums, I’m sure you’ll be inspired to put paint to paper. Enjoy exploring the possibilities.

EDITORIAL Editor Niki Browes Art Editor Stuart Selner Assistant Editor Ramsha Vistro Contributors Adebanji Alade, Matthew Haydn Jeanes, Penel Kirk, Greg Mason, Adrian Mourby, Jake Spicer, Ann Witheridge

ADVERTISING Group Sales Director Catherine Chapman (020) 7349 3709 catherine.chapman@ chelseamagazines.com Business Development Manager Emily Driscoll (020) 7349 3784 emily.driscoll@ chelseamagazines.com Advertising Production allpointsmedia.co.uk

MANAGEMENT & PUBLISHING Chairman Paul Dobson Managing Director James Dobson Publisher Simon Temlett Chief Financial Officer Vicki Gavin EA to Chairman Sophie Easton Subs Marketing Manager Bret Weekes Group Digital Manager Ben Iskander

ONLINE ENQUIRIES support@artistsandillustrators.co.uk

Niki Browes Editor

BACK ISSUES chelseamagazines.com/shop ISSN NO. 1473-4729

GET IN TOUCH

INTRODUCING

ADEBANJI AL ADE

A portrait, figurative and landscape painter, Adebanji is also the Vice President of The Royal Institute of Oil Painters. Along with being The One Show’s Artist in Residence, he teaches at the Heatherley School of Fine Art and the Art Academy. He also takes part in talks and demonstration workshops.

4 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

PENEL KIRK

In the 1980s, Penel studied fashion and textiles at St Martins School of Art, then worked as a textile designer.

As a fine artist, she hopes her work will help to highlight the plight of thousands of species endangered through poaching, climate change, and the destruction of their habitats.

TOM CROFT

Tom is a portrait painter from Oxford who initiated Portraits for NHS Heroes. He has produced paintings for a wide range of clients, from Manchester United to Tinie Tempah. Tom shows at the Royal Society of Portrait Painters and is a member of the Contemporary British Portrait Painters Collective.

Artists & Illustrators, The Chelsea Magazine Company Ltd, Jubilee House, 2 Jubilee Place, London SW3 3TQ Phone: (020) 7349 3700 artistsandillustrators.co.uk

R AMSHA VISTRO

Our new Assistant Editor made the switch to journalism from law five years ago. Since then, her passion for the arts has only grown. She enjoys visiting art galleries as it keeps her in touch with her creative side.

Ramsha is looking forward to getting her teeth into her new role. Welcome!

Write to us!

Send us your latest paintings, tips or artistic discoveries and you could win a £50 voucher: info@artistsandillustrators.co.uk @AandImagazine /ArtistsAndIllustrators @AandImagazine @AandImagazine

Sketchbook T I PS • A DV ICE • EX H IBI TIONS • NEWS • R EV IEWS

E D ITE D BY SAR AH E D G H I LL

Things we love...

COPYRIGHT THE ESTATE OF SUZANNE COOPER

Suzanne Cooper was a rising star of British Modernism in the 1930s, but with the advent of WW2 she abandoned her artistic ambitions. In recent years her enchanting work has been rediscovered and a new book showcases 50 of her paintings, drawings and sketches, in which she depicts the oddity and charm of life through lively seaside and street scenes.

Suzanne Cooper: Paintings From Under The Spare-room Bed by Lucy Hughes-Hallett, Jenny Uglow and Andrew Stewart, £35, The Mainstone Press themainstonepress.com

Bloomfield Terrace, 1936, oil on canvas

ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 5

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Sketchbook

Trending now Like everything in life, art has constantly reinvented itself and artists throughout the centuries have sought new and unique ways of expressing themselves. But what does the immediate future hold for the art world? According to the world-renowned Eden Gallery, based in Manhattan, here are the Top Ten Art Trends to look out for in 2022: 1 Virtual Art Events – these have become more sophisticated and can reach larger global audiences.

2 3D Motion Graphic Design – technology lets us enjoy more art at home and artists are using it to create digital outdoor exhibits.

3 Crypto Art – last year saw record-breaking sales and increased awareness of NFTs. 4 Street Art – it’s been around for years, but has never been more accessible.

5 Art Outdoors – There’s a broad trend to take art outdoors and into unconventional spaces, making it ‘public’ in unique and innovative locations.

6 Appreciation for Nature – connecting with the natural world is always popular.

7 Contemporary African Art – it’s time for African art to shine.

8 Neon at Home – bright neon artworks are moving from galleries into our homes.

9 The Memphis Revival – this bold, geometric 1980s style is making a comeback.

10 Art and Science Converge – artists and scientists are both grappling with issues like climate change.

Join us online! BO O K O F T HE MO NT H

If you love the magazine’s redesign, you’re going to fall head over heels for the new look Artists & Illustrators website. It’s still one of the biggest resources for artists on the internet, but a fresh new feel makes our how to guides, competitions and interviews even more enjoyable to read. artistsandillustrators.co.uk

THE DIARY Open calls, prizes and artist opportunities

9 SEP TEMBER Oil artists are invited to submit to the Royal Institute of Oil Painters Annual Exhibition to be held at the Mall Galleries in November.

Mallgalleries.org.uk. call-for-entries

HOW TO C ROSSHATC H IN PEN & INK

by August Lamm There’s everything the novice crosshatcher could hope for here: a potted history of the artform, a look at the best materials to use and a practical guide to the basics. For those who want to be challenged further, there are also more complicated subjects like anatomy, portraiture and still life. A combination of fine art examples, illustrations and step-by-step tutorials make this an essential guide.

Ilex Press, £20.00

10 SEP TEMBER The Doncaster-based gallery, D31, is inviting entries in any medium for its autumn exhibition. What's more, it's free to enter.

D31artgallery.com/ autumn-exhibition

18 SEP TEMBER If you’re within five years of graduation, the Ingram Prize is calling for submissions from contemporary artists. Up to two works in any media, free to enter.

Ingramprize.artopps.co.uk

30 SEP TEMBER Top prize money totalling € 80,000 is on offer for this annual international art prize from the Luxembourgbased Pinacotheque Museum.

Luxembourgartprize.com

ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 7

Creative study that fits around you...

With Open College of the Arts you can study short courses, foundation courses and BA (hons) degrees from home.

Creative Writing, Garden Design, Interior Design, Music, Textiles and more...

Explore our courses at: www.oca.ac.uk Flexible, open access, distanced learning experts Open College of the Arts

the distance learning arm of

Open College of the Arts

Sketchbook

Don’t miss...

...the chance to show off your eye for detail. The National Brain Appeal is inviting artists to create an artwork on an envelope, as part of A Letter in Mind. This is the NBA’s fundraising exhibition, where all entries will be displayed at an exhibition at Gallery Different in London’s Fitzrovia, in November.

In recent years, the exhibition has featured artworks donated by Grayson Perry, Tracey Emin, Sir Antony Gormley and Olafur Eliasson.

Sisters Ishbel and Morag Myerscough are regular contributors, as are Chantal Joffe and Mark Entwisle.

All entries will be priced at £85 and displayed anonymously from 3rd-6th November, previewing on 2nd November. The identity of the artist is revealed at the end of the exhibition, once the artwork has sold, and proceeds will fund projects at The National Hospital for Neurology.

The deadline for all entries is 30 September.

Get your entries in today by registering at: aletterinmind.org

BE INSPIRED Whatever stage you’re at with your art, make sure you put yourself forward and enter every competition – you never know where it may take you.

Artist Rae Hicks has just been announced as the first winner of the £10,000 Waverton Art Prize, which also comes with the opportunity to put on a solo exhibition at Boisdale’s Alice’s Oyster Bar & Gallery, a

hidden gem of contemporary art in the heart of London.

Hicks was chosen as the overall winner from nearly 700 submissions from across the world.

“Being chosen was a complete surprise, and has been an amazing experience,” he says.

“Things like this can be so important to sustaining a practice.

It has very much changed the shape of the year to come.”

Watch out for...

The Beast is surreal animated morality tale, conceived by Scottish artist, Ruth Ewan, and commissioned by Collective, creates a conversation between the Scottish/American steel magnate, Andrew Carnegie, and his namesake, the dinosaur, Diplodocus Carnegii. The installation is presented alongside archive material and looks at ideas surrounding power, exploitation, culture and the history of capitalism. The Beast will be roaring at City Dome, The City Observatory, Edinburgh EH7 5AA, until 18th September.

ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 9

Sketchbook

Exhibitions IMAGES © THE ARTIST, COURTESY CLOUGH GALLERY

T H E B E S T A R T S H OW S T O V I S I T T H I S S E P T E M B E R

R APHAEL – MAG ISTER R AFFAELLO Until 24th September This digital art exhibition marks the 500th anniversary of the Italian Renaissance artist and large-scale projectors and displays show recreations of his masterpieces.

10 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

Raphael was also a tapestry designer and the Dovecot is a renowned tapestry studio, so some of its weavers have created a contemporary work inspired by his designs.

Dovecot Studios & Art Gallery, Infirmary Street, Edinburgh EH1 1LT dovecotstudios.com

JADÉ FADOJUTIMI 16th September to 19th March 23 A major exhibition of new works by Jadé Fadojutimi, whose large-scale paintings combine abstract and figurative elements in compositions with intense graphic energy.

Sketchbooks will also be on display, and the exhibition is being accompanied by a book.

The Hepworth, Wakefield WF1 5AW hepworthwakefield.org

IMAGES © THE ARTIST, COURTESY THE HEPWORTH

COURTESY UFFIZI GALLERY

RUTH C L AY TON: THE POWER OF WATER 5th October to 30th December A stunning collection of watercolour and mixed media work by an artist with a fascination for water and how it moves. Clayton’s work includes beautiful rivers, streams, lakes and seas, all reflecting and refracting sunlight, creating clever abstract patterns which catch and play with the light.

Clough Gallery, Farfield Mill, Sedburgh, Cumbria, LA10 5LW

BODY & SOUL Until 2nd October Drawn from Cecil Higgins Art Gallery Collection, this exhibition features sculpture, prints, oils and watercolours, and looks at how women have been represented over the past 200 years.

It examines how beauty and femininity have been celebrated and challenged, with women seen as objects of desire, as well as being recognised as creatives in their own right, going beyond traditional stereotypes. There are artworks by Degas, Munch, Matisse, Freud and Litchenstein.

The Higgins, Bedford, MK40 3XD thehigginsbedford.org.uk

IMAGES © THE ARTIST, COURTESY OF ROYAL PAVILLION & MUSEUMS, BRIGHTON & HOVE

AUBRE Y BE ARDSLE Y: A BRIGHTON BOY Until 2nd October A small but fascinating exhibition on the North Balcony of the Brighton Museum, looking at the life and work of Aubrey Beardsley and the time he spent in Brighton, from his early career as an illustrator to his death at the age of just 26.

Brighton Museum, Royal Pavilion Gardens, BN1 1EE brightonmuseums.org

© TRUSTEES OF THE CECIL HIGGINS ART GALLERY

IMAGES © AMANDA TURNER, COURTESY CYFARTHFA CASTLE ART GALLERY

C ELEBR ATION OF WELSH CONTEMPOR ARY PAINTING Until 2nd October This biennial series of events and exhibitions across Wales, celebrates the best contemporary artists in the country and the exhibition at Cyfarthfa Castle Art Gallery includes work by Charles Burton, Cerys Knighton, Gus Payne and Amanda Turner.

Cyfarthfa Castle Museum & Art Gallery, Merthyr Tydfil wellbeingmerthyr.co.uk

PR IZE DRAW

WIN!

£1,000 WORTH OF REVOLUTIONARY LIGHTFAST PENCILS!

Enter our prize draw for the chance to experience a velvety smooth laydown of colour, courtesy of DERWENT

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our artworks should remain vibrant over a long time – months and even years later. The last thing you want is for all of your hard work to gradually fade away just because the mediums you selected didn’t perform well in terms of lightfastness.

With this in mind, we’ve teamed up with Derwent to offer a set of 72 Lightfast Pencils worth £250 to four lucky readers of Artists & Illustrators. The vibrant coloured pencils are 100% lightfast and feature an oil-based core revolutionised to resist long-term fading.

A pigment’s chemical stability under prolonged exposure to light is referred to as lightfastness. Derwent’s Lightfast Pencils have been tested under the most extreme circumstances under internationally recognised standards to provide artists with the best quality.

These premium oil-based pencils have an exceptional spectrum of colours not found

in other lightfast collections and can create an oil paint effect when combined with oil mediums. The core produces a luxurious finish while its vivid colours provide an opaque laydown.

Derwent has a rich history stretching back to 1832 and has maintained its pride in its Cumbrian heritage. They combine traditional pencil making with modern manufacturing methods and their inventive team never stops looking for fresh concepts to constantly develop their selection.

Their originality results from a profound awareness of artists’ needs. Derwent has provided various art tools that range from the first colouring pencil to the finest professional materials because it recognises that artists’ aspirations can change throughout their artistic lives. derwentart.com/en-gb

THE PRIZES Four winners, chosen at random, will each receive a set of 72 Derwent Lightfast Pencils selected from 100 different shades, worth £250.

HOW TO ENTER Enter by noon on 2 October 2022, either at artistsandillustrators.co.uk/ competitions or by filling in the form below and returning it to: Derwent Prize Draw, Artists & Illustrators, Chelsea Magazine Company Ltd, Jubilee House, 2 Jubilee Place, London SW3 3TQ TERMS & CONDITIONS The prize is non-transferable. No cash alternatives are available.

For full terms and conditions, visit chelseamagazine.com/terms

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The closing date for entries is noon on 2 October 2022.

Please tick if you are happy to receive relevant information from The Chelsea Magazine Company Ltd. via email post or phone or Raw Umber Studios via email

HOW I WORK IN TH E S TUDI O An Age of Indigo, coloured pencil, 25x20cm

Tamsin Dearing This talented artist spends hours creating detailed portraits in her Cornish studio, and, as she tells Sarah Edghill, aims to capture every wrinkle and laughter line ▸

14 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

E

ven successful artists experience early setbacks, particularly at school, where creativity isn’t always recognised if it doesn’t conform to the norm. But looking at Tamsin Dearing’s stunning portraits, it’s hard to believe she almost failed her GCSE Art. “My work was pretty good, but I wasn’t creating to order,” she says. “So, I think my low grade was more about not meeting certain curriculum requirements than a judgement of my technical abilities. I didn’t understand that at the time and it really knocked my confidence. But it helped me realise I’m not suited to being taught in the formal sense. I am happier working things out as I go along and experimenting to please myself rather than having to meet anyone else’s criteria.”

Tamsin continued to draw as a hobby, and got commissions through word of mouth.

Slowly her confidence and reputation grew.

“Social media has helped me reach others and find a community which, growing up pre-Internet, I had no way of connecting with. I wonder if I would have focussed on art sooner if I’d had access to that, or if comparing myself to other artists would have intimidated me when starting out?”

Specialising in pencil and pastel portraiture, Tamsin’s work captures the soul of her sitters. “People fascinate me, in a psychological and sociological sense, and in a visual form too. There is something that never ceases to intrigue me about faces and how similar yet utterly different we all are.

I particularly enjoy drawing people from different cultures, and those who are older. I hope to portray something of what connects us all across the generations and continents, and to foster a sense of kinship while celebrating difference. Beauty standards are forever narrowing and evolving, dictated to us by society. I hope in a small way to offer an alternative, to show how magnificent we all are, and to highlight the wonder of wrinkles. A long life is a privilege, and to try to erase evidence of that in our skin makes no sense to me. I think one of the most beautiful things about a face is when years of small moments of joy culminate in laughter lines, and those lines fold and curl with yet another broad smile and sparkling eyes.

That is a work of art in itself.”

A portrait can take more than 50 hours, so Tamsin mainly works from photographs.

“Digital technology has made photography so much more accessible, and I can zoom in on an image and study the details. I often wonder how the essence of the person appears in a portrait, and suspect it’s a ▸

16 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

Koda, graphite pencil, 25x20cm

Portraiture makes my heart sing and some of that love is imparted into the work

H O W I W OR K I N T HE S T UDI O Posturing Peacock of Pencarrow, coloured pencil, 20x28cm

Sita, coloured pencil, 25x19cm

H O W I WORK IN T H E S TUDI O

A Handful of Lotus Seeds, pastel, 29x20cm

H O W I W O R K I N T HE S T UDI O combination of factors. Really loving what I do plays a big part: portraiture makes my heart sing and some of that love is imparted into the work. It’s an intimate process, in some ways I know the faces of those I have drawn better than my own family, as I study them so intently for hours. Even in a quick sketch, the personality is in the details: getting the line of a nose just right, the cock of the head or the look in an eye. That is where we instinctively recognise one another in daily life; my role as an artist is to find these nuances and faithfully represent them in a language of my own.”

After many years of working on her bed, the sofa or at the kitchen table, Tamsin has recently been able to dedicate a room in her home to her art. “I have a studio for the first time, and what a luxury it is! Having this space at home is ideal, as I can pop in there at any time and be far more productive.”

She’s a tidy artist, but keeps it simple. “No colour coordinated supplies or dedicated drawers of pastels, just as few materials as I can get away with and everything within easy reach. Graphite is the easiest as one pencil case holds everything I need, and with coloured pencil and pastel, I keep together all the colours I am using for a particular portrait. I tend to flit around the page, working on whatever catches my eye at any given moment, so it’s vital to be able to swap colours and know that I have my fur, fabric or skin palette right there.”

Tamsin has positioned her drawing table so she can see her garden, which is where she’s most likely to be found if she isn’t drawing. “I have been creating a biodiverse wildlife garden where I grow fruit, vegetables and flowers. It offers me a visual distraction and somewhere to refresh my eyes when I’m finding myself looking too narrowly at the artwork I’m creating. Nature brings much needed balance when working from home, as it is easy to get too drawn into the to do list when work and life blend.”

Now she is a full-time artist, Tamsin can choose to work whenever it suits her: some days all she wants to do is draw, others she needs a break to recharge. “Being selfemployed takes a lot of motivation; when a deadline is approaching, I’ll give everything to get the job done. I love being awake late at night when the world is at its quietest; I can easily lose myself in a drawing for hours, fuelled by cups of tea and the promise of ‘I’ll just do this bit then I’ll stop…’”

Graphite was her first love, and is still her medium of choice. “For the last 20 years my trustiest tools have been four mechanical pencils, with leads in B, 2B, 3B and 4B. The versatile B is the one I use most. I found

L E F T Bess, graphite pencil, 25x19cm B E L OW Daryl, coloured pencil, 26x25cm

The simplicity of using just a few pencils is part of the appeal for me that, by holding it at different angles and using either the blunt side or a sharp point, I could get a wide range of effects on textured paper. Applying these techniques to the four pencils, I can achieve a full spectrum of shading which, when layered, gives me

everything I need. The simplicity of using just a few pencils is part of the appeal for me and, when combined with a kneadable eraser - as much for drawing with as for removing mistakes - I am all set.”

Having mastered graphite, she moved onto coloured pencil, then pastels. “The way pastels blend on the page has a wonderfully tactile creaminess. But I always find myself keen to use graphite again for the clarity of the monochrome and the simplicity of the tools. I am interested in how monochrome and full colour change the way we see an image, and which details we’re led to focus on by the value of the colours either used or omitted. It took me years to understand the importance of shading to create form, and to trust that building depth is not the same as making something too dark. Embracing the shadows has been the single most important thing in my drawing learning; my students heard my mantra ‘make the darks darker’ more often than anything else, but contrast is everything and brings a picture to life.”

Three of Tamsin’s ‘hand’ studies will be shown as part of the Society of Women Artists Exhibition at the Mall Galleries from 6th – 11th September tamsindearing.co.uk ▫ ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 19

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ADVERTORIAL

New and original ART ACADEMY LONDON

launches a one-of-a-kind specialist BA in Contemporary Portraitur

A

RT ACAdemy London was founded in

2000 to offer something different: the best of an old-school atelier combined with the vibrancy and diversity of a contemporary art school. From September 2022, a new offering is their specialist BA in Contemporary Portraiture, the only BA of its kind in Europe, validated by The Open University. Students will be able to embrace the diversity of contemporary art practices while learning the technical and creative skills needed to become a portrait painter whilst it also offers some of the highest contact hours of any higher education art course in the UK. As well as helping you develop the in-depth technical skills needed to take your art practice forward, you’ll be encouraged to think critically about the wider theoretical and historical contexts of contemporary portraiture and apply that knowledge to your practical work.

To further add to your study, you’ll have access to lectures and talks by eminent visiting artists, open access to the print studio, a session learning to sculpt a portrait head (and access to further sculpture classes) and can drop into Open Life sessions on weekend mornings. You can also take advantage of free places on other evening, weekend and short courses (these are available at the discretion of the Academy and subject to availability).

There are three stages to the BA (Hons) Contemporary Portraiture, which you can complete in three years (full time) or six years (part-time), and there are four main components to the BA: ● Studio Practice modules where you’ll develop a series of projects in response to various briefs. These modules are taught through one-to-one tutorials, group critiques,

workshops, lectures and practical work in a studio. ● Elective Skills Workshop courses where you receive intensive training in the technical skills you need to develop your creative vision and directly support your Studio Practice modules. ● Art History, Cultural and Contextual Studies modules designed to build your wider knowledge through studying and analysing artistic discourses and theories, and modern and contemporary practice. ● Professional Development Modules focusing on the skills and knowledge necessary for future employment in the arts and creative industries.

By the time you graduate, you’ll have the confidence and ability to exhibit your work, take on commissions, apply for further study and find work in the creative industries.

They welcome all enthusiastic candidates to apply and want to make sure as many students as possible can access the highquality fine art education they provide. As part of this, they offer bursaries to help with tuition fees which you may be eligible for.

If you are interested in studying with Art Academy London, please email academiccourses@artacademy.org.uk or call +44 (0) 20 7407 6969 to discuss their courses further or arrange a visit.

Find out more: artacademy.org.uk/bacontemporary-portraiture/

“The Contemporary Portrait BA is an exciting, brand new degree course. It’s pretty unique as it not only focuses on traditional methods of portrait painting but also explores innovative ways to question what a portrait is or can be. Our students cultivate rich, exciting practices that prepare them for professional careers as artists.”

Sadie Lee, Contemporary Portraiture Pathway Leader

Distortion 1, 140x140cm

2 2 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

H O W I W O R K HO W I PA I NT

Rory Hancock G Art never stands still and

RORY HANCOCK

is proud of the fact that his work is constantly evolving, as he tells Niki Browes

rowing up in Neath, in South Wales, Rory taught himself to paint by copying artworks in an old catalogue, the originals of which had been done by his late grandfather, Kenneth Hancock. His family encouraged him to explore his creativity and, after doing a foundation course in fine art at Swansea Art College, he did a degree in Illustration and Graphic Design at De Montfort University. After graduating, he came across an advert for a job as a studio painting assistant with a well-known artist in Devon. His time there helped him realise he could use his talent for art to make a living whilst it also gave him the confidence to leave after six years and pursue a solo career. ▸

ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 2 3

Rich, oil, 61x61cm

I was always fascinated by glamour, opulence and excess. Fashion magazines and editorials inspired a lot of my pieces and, although my style has evolved recently, in the early years I had a strong desire to explore the topic of consumerism. The photographer David Lachappelle was a big inspiration; I enjoy his bold use of colours and dynamic compositions. There is humour in a lot of his work, but also an unsettling element which makes you reconsider everything that is actually happening in his pieces. In my earlier artwork, in a similar fashion to Lachappelle, I’d mix ideas of luxury with something ugly 2 4 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

or sinister; a Birkin bag surrounded by rats or a Chanel bottle shaped like a skull.

I want my art to say something about the human psyche. My artwork is far from political, but there are so many horrors going on in the world right now, that it’s easy to bury our heads in a bubble of consumer-filled waffle as a distraction. My artwork hopefully challenges that ignorance in a semi-playful way. I think there’s an ugliness in being shackled by consumption and the social confines of ‘keeping up appearances;’ validating our self-worth with materialistic wants. But I am also a self-

confessed consumerist and I get joy from purchasing inanimate things. Yes, next to painting, online shopping would have to be my main hobby. I think in my earlier work I was trying to dissect my own mindset and make a visual representation of my own conflicting opinions.

Oils offer so much depth of colour. They are more versatile than any other medium I’ve tried. Because I work in a detailed way, I need the paint to stay wet for as long as possible, so it can be manipulated and blended sufficiently. I don’t use painting medium, which is rare for an oil painter, but

H O W I W O R K HO W I PA I NT

Chanel Skull, oil, 100x100cm

I like the uniformity I get when the paint comes straight from the tube without interference - that way I can avoid areas of the painting looking patchy. I tend to use Winsor & Newton because they’re very consistent in texture, along with a few Michael Harding colours for their vibrancy.

The world changed during the pandemic, and I wanted my art to mirror that. Like a lot of people, I found that period to be quite surreal and I couldn’t continue to paint what I had been painting with conviction. The focus of my artwork shifted away from consumerism, to

exploring how ideologies and fixed beliefs can become warped and confused. Taking classic images and contorting them into something unrecognisable was my way of producing a literal representation of the idea that no truth is objective. The idea came to me by accident. I was trying to think of ways to paint what I was feeling and nothing was working out. After a dozen failed attempts, I scribbled over a piece of artwork in frustration; it was a swirl, and looking at it for a long time, I realised there was a beauty in the simplicity of the mark-making. As an idea, it said everything I wanted it to, in a relatable and identifiable way. So far, I’ve

produced a handful of this style of work, which I call my Distortion Series.

My work is constantly evolving. That’s what keeps me motivated. I want my artwork to be strong and resonate with as many people as possible; I don’t think that would be possible if it all looked the same.

Times change constantly and if you care about your artwork being meaningful, you need to keep up with that change.

Occasionally I’ll question if something is working as well as I’d like it to, but I don’t get stuck on that feeling for too long. If I did, I’d get nothing done. It’s best to work through ▸ ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 2 5

Distortion 2, oil, 110x110cm

26 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

H O W I W O R K HO W I PA I NT negative thoughts. If you look at the same artwork for too long you go through a range of emotions – love through to hate – but it’s indifference that’s the real killer. If you finish a piece and feel completely emotionally detached from it, it’s probably not working well as an artwork. That’s when the canvas gets scrapped and re-stretched.

McBirkin, oil, 61x61cm

My studio is in an old commercial building in the centre of Swansea. It’s run by an artistic collective called Elysium, and is a big, sterile space with high ceilings and lots of natural, north-facing light. It’s the ideal space for painting and being creative. The building has about ten other artists working there and it’s good to have a creative community to share ideas with.

No piece takes less than a month to produce. I’d say I’m pretty quick for the scale and level of detail I like in my works, but that’s eight-hour days and six-day weeks. My buyers expect a level of quality and detail, that I just couldn’t reproduce if I painted any faster. I always have one painting on the wall which I’m working on at any given time, then I use the other walls of my studio to prep and prime other canvases.

I like to apply my own gesso to the canvas and sand it back to a fine tooth, which is great for detail.

I really need to get better with social media. Instagram especially is so important for artists to share their work and communicate new ideas, but I’m a bit awkward with it, to be honest. Taking a picture of something I do and posting it online still feels alien to me, I’m all about living in the moment. But my friends are dragging me reluctantly into the 21st century and I’m posting more content online from my studio.

Take advice from other artists on techniques; be humble and receptive to thier practise Hungry For It, oil, 100x100cm

Grow a thick skin if you want to become a professional artist. As good as you think you are, there will always be people who are less than kind about your artwork. I had countless doors close on me, and almost lost the love for what I was doing because I placed too much focus on other people’s opinions. Don’t listen to them.. Take advice from other artists on techniques: be humble and receptive to their practice. Also get the best materials you can afford. If you use good quality canvas and have a handful of good quality brushes and look after them, they will last you for years and make your paintings that much better. maddoxgallery.com/artists/301-roryhancock/ ▫ ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 27

France vide grenier local flea market Chassignolles, oil on canvas, 27x35cm

2 8 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

We present...

This m o n t h ’s spotlight on a Portfolio member

ROBERT MEE

An artist who has invented a novel way to travel and paint

E

n plein air has always been Robert Mee’s favourite form of art. Originally from West Wales, Mee’s work was inspired by the beauty of being close to the sea, along with the feelings of freedom and space that came from the mountainous farmland which stretched away from the coast. He and his wife, Kate, are now in the process of applying to move to France and, as they await their Cartes de Sejours, they are busy renovating their French house, garden and art studios – of which there are three so far.

“In France, I tend to paint later in the evening when it is cooler, capturing the last of the precious warm summer sunlight. I am particularly drawn to the French towns and villages, for they give such character, atmosphere and old world charm to a painting.”

Mee is happy to travel to find inspiration, and he and Kate regularly set off in their custom-made campervan, visiting other areas of France in search of the beautiful landscapes and medieval townscapes, where the busy cafés and market scenes feature so prominently in his work.

But for local trips, the campervan isn’t always practical, so Mee has adapted his bicycle and turned it into a painting station, perfect for local outdoor expeditions. The bicycle carries his painting box on a panier at the back, and there is also an extendable easel by the rear wheel, along with a fold-out tray for his sketchbook and palette, while his brush holder hangs over the crossbar as he works.

He uses both watercolour and oil, letting the weather conditions and subject matter dictate which he will choose. “I reach for watercolour when I want to capture mood and atmosphere and a certain romantic softness to the painting.

I love the texture that oils can create and the Impressionistic nature that can be created with loose brushstrokes and greater definition of light, colour and shadow.” portfolio.artistsandillustrators.co.uk/robertmee ▫ ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 29

Tom Croft He may have been awarded a British Empire Medal for initiating Portraits for NHS Heroes, but TOM CROFT is at his happiest when challenged with capturing the visual appearance of a person

P

ortraits for NHS Heroes was undeniably one of the defining artistic movements of the pandemic. It was an idea initiated by portrait artist Tom Croft in the first lockdown of 2020, and quickly snowballed into a global movement, reminding us of the power of portraiture by recording life events, people and stories. While awardwinning philanthropic acts might not have been a given in Tom’s life plan, art certainly was. His father was an architect who loved art history, while his mother was a talented draughtswoman. Not only were there always books lying around the house about artists like Rembrandt, Hockney, Dürer and Frank Lloyd Wright, but there was also a regular stream of artistic luminaries, including abstract artist Margaret Bialokoz-Smith, who showed Tom how to screen print.

He still remembers the excitement 3 0 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

he felt as a young boy when he drew something and was told he’d got the likeness. From the beginning he looked for visually obvious character traits when he created portraits of favourite subject: “Bjorn Borg - with his headband, which looked so tight it had pushed his eyes too close together. Princess Leia with her Danish pastry hairdo and Geoff Boycott with his lopsided mouth.

Being dyslexic, I couldn’t read quickly enough to get immersed in books, so anything visual worked for me.”

As a boy he fell in love with Herge’s drawings of Tintin, and to this day he still collects Tintin merchandise when he finds it at French street markets.

Last year he painted Tintin, Captain Haddock and Snowy on his garden shed, then, on the nearby fence, added the shark submarine designed by Professor Calculus.

Tom now works from a studio in his garden, which he opens every May as part of Oxfordshire Artweeks. ▸

T HE B I G I NT E R V I E W

Josphat, oil on canvas, 46x36cm

ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 31

TH E BIG INTERVIEW Boaz, oil on canvas, 51x41cm

Robyn, oil on canvas, 41x30.5cm

Creativity was always encouraged in our house. I remember visiting the National Gallery and my dad encouraged me to touch a Rembrandt self-portrait while he kept a lookout for security staff - that was a pretty electric and formative moment. My parents even let my brother, sister and me paint an enormous and probably quite appalling mural on our bathroom wall.

Creativity was never wrong. When I was seven, I did a copy of a Rembrandt painting and my parents put it in a ludicrously ornate frame; I’m convinced to this day it made me believe I could and possibly should be an artist. My mum recently designed a line drawing tattoo of her dog, a wire-haired dachshund called Lola, which my daughter has had inked on her leg. We still don’t know how we feel about this - the price of encouraging creativity?

Portraiture is the most accessible form of painting. I love people-watching in bars and restaurants and portraits are an extension of that. I’m drawn to painting people whose personalities are written in neon letters on their faces. Occasionally, I’ll see someone who interests me visually for whatever reason and I’ll ask if I can paint them. It can sound a bit dodgy, so I quickly show my website details to prove I’m not a raging pervert trying to pick them up.

Mostly people are flattered and agree to sit, but once I asked someone at the Royal Society of Portrait Painters show and they just said no. That shocked me and was quite awkward.

I love the challenge of trying to capture visual appearance. But I also try to capture something deeper. I love meeting new people and trying to figure out who they are and how best to describe them back to the viewer. Where possible I work from a combination of photos and a life sitting. I’ll take a couple of hundred pictures then make sketches from the most interesting ones.

Once my clients approve the sketch and agree the direction of the portrait’s lighting, composition and content, I begin the final painting. The photos only form a guide and sometimes the worse the reference photos are, the better the painting, because you have to invent and create more. It’s important to not slavishly copy a reference; it may be how someone looked in that second but it won’t feel exactly like them.

I’m a combination of shy, with a bit of performer thrown in. Taking part in Sky Arts Portrait Artist of the year in 2018 was a really beneficial experience because it ▸

T HE B I G I NT E R V I E W

Mark Ormrod MBE, oil on canvas, 76x61cm

Tinie, oil on canvas, 51x41cm

Port Meadow, oil on canvas, 30x25cm

Mark Haddon after triple heart bypass, oil on canvas, 76x61cm

Sleepy selfie, oil on canvas, 30x25cm

Tom’s paint palette

3 4 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

T HE B I G I NT E R V I E W pushed me out of my comfort zone. Unlike musicians, painters don’t have to perform in public and often prefer working in solitude.

While I was beyond nervous before and during the recording, I perversely loved it too. I’m one of those nightmare people who doesn’t ever want to do karaoke, but if I’m forced into it, you can’t get me off the mic. I had a lovely day painting and chatting to Kirsty Wark on Portrait Artist of the Year but zoned out of the whole time-limit thing. By the time I realised I should be worried about the deadline, it was too late to finish the portrait well. But I loved that you could hear the audience, because they were right by you. A woman next to me said loudly to her mate, “He’s got the nose all wrong.”

My palette is undeniably odd. At the start of each painting session, I squeeze out the colours I think I’ll need and I used to scrape it all off at the end of each day. But we left to go on holiday once, before I’d cleaned my palette, and when I came back, rather than sanding off the paint I just squeezed a bit more of each colour on top of the previous

Painting faces has a value: it’s celebrating, people for future generations lot and over the years this has been my practice. It’s built to form a truly insane alien landscape that’s also the story of my last 20 years of painting portraits. I’ve been offered good money for it and people have suggested I enter it into the Turner Prize.

Landscapes are like a palette cleanser, excuse the bad pun, in between faces. I occasionally paint Port Meadow which is a vast bit of land in Oxford, where I live, with a river running down one side of it. You can see weather fronts coming in for miles, which is inspiring to paint. The light or mood of it interests me rather than the details. If a cloud or tree is out of place nobody will notice, but if an eye or nose is half a millimetre out, it screams at the viewer and the likeness is lost.

My pieces take so long to create. I know artists who don’t spend more than two days on the same piece, but I take weeks and sometimes a couple of months. Generally, the more successful paintings go quicker

Dad, oil on canvas, 41x30cm

and almost paint themselves. You know you’re in the groove when you look back and wonder how you did a patch of painting: you go into another part of the brain and something else takes over. I wish I could always access that brain space.

I prefer background noise to silence. I listen to music, radio and podcasts while I paint, although sometimes the music will put me off if I’m too into the tune. But my ADHD means I benefit from some extra stimulation and the more I learn about that, the better headspace I’ll hopefully be in, to work. Most people would find other distractions irritating but it quietens that

fizzy bit of my mind and allows me to work well and concentrate for hours.

No other job exposes you to such a range of people. Doctors, scientists, professors, artists, musicians, footballers, bankers, politicians; you name it. Painting faces has a value: it’s celebrating, recording, preserving people for future generations.

Then I also get the performance of the reveal at the end! I’m extremely aware how lucky I am professionally and never presume it will last. On that note, if you can wait a while, I’m open for commissions. thomascroft.co.uk ▫ ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 3 5

Jim M Fans of JIM MOIR - AKA the comedian, writer, artist, and national treasure Vic Reeves - will already know about his love of birds. Now he’s turned it into an artistic obsession, finds Niki Browes

H

e’s best known for his iconic stage name, Vic Reeves, but Jim Moir claims that art has always been a priority over fame.

“People think I’m a comedian, but art and painting has always been my passion,” he explains.

Growing up in the countryside in Darlington, his house was full of various paints and art materials as his mum was an artist. “So it was a case of whatever I could get my hands on. Back then, not every household had a television, so you had to make your own entertainment.

When I was a kid, we used to go on the hunt for bird’s eggs and take one and go and put it in a shoebox with sawdust in it. Then me and my mates would go out into the field and look for birds, and draw them.” ▸

Blue Tit

oir Hoopoe

E X T R A CT

Green Woodpecker ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 37

Carrion Crow

Fieldfare

Today, he paints six days a week and starts as soon as he wakes up in one of his two studios. “I’ve got an oil studio that is really dirty because oil paint gets all over the place. And I’ve just had a watercolour studio built, which is like hospital-clean.

We’ve got a garden which is about an acre, so I’ve got the oil studio at the end, and the watercolour studio is next to the house. I got the studios because I was painting in the house, and my wife told me I had to get out. So that’s where I’ve been doing my watercolours now – and it’s got superb air conditioning, so the paint doesn’t dry too quickly.”

It was watercolour that he used to illustrate his new book, BIRDS. Paintings of 100 British Birds. “When I started doing them, they were really quite scrappy and then over time, they got more detailed and finally tuned.” Intense and meticulously detailed, his studies of wrens, finches, water birds, a nightingale and more are beautifully observed, detailed works of ornithology. They even prompted the Guardian to label him as the Warhol of bird painting. “That was nice of them, wasn’t it? I think it was because I did a blue tit pecking into some vim instead of a milk bottle. Back when I was a lad, people had milk bottles delivered outside their front door and blue tits worked out how to peck through the foil, 3 8 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

get into the milk and drink it. So, it was a play on that and where they got that idea from, I think.”

His friend, the English naturalist and television presenter Chris Packham says of Jim’s bird paintings, “To me, Jim’s process actually appears more instinctive than constructed, which in turn makes it far more admirable and valuable than ‘clever’.

There are plenty of clever artists; sometimes I enjoy unravelling their art, but I prefer art that talks to me; talks straight.”

As his popularity as a painter has soared in recent years, the simplicity and sincerity of his bird paintings have given them cult status among his fans; he admits to having completed over two thousand to date, which he sells via Instagram and an agent.

Inspiration comes from a huge bird station in his garden, “that I spend far too long looking at.” Still, he doesn’t see himself ever stopping bird watching or painting the two-legged creatures that fascinate him so much. “I don’t think it’s something that will ever disappear; it will never wane.

People seem to really like them, for one thing, and I get a kick out of it.” Nor will his motivation to paint. “It’s been a constant passion since I was in short trousers and I’m now 63. Long may it continue.”

BIRDS: Paintings of 100 British Birds.

Published on 1st September 2022 by UNBOUND. £14.99. Available for pre-order

Barn Owl

E X T R A CT

Painting has been a passion since I was in short trousers and now I’m 63

Hobby ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 39

GUEST EXP ERT

ASK THE EXPERT

Jurga Vilimaite Jurga Vilimaite is a watercolourist and Manager of Cass Art’s London flagship store in Islington. We caught up with her to find out about her practice and get her top tips for watercolour painting

JURGA’S TOP TIPS

1

Create interesting first layers by using a wet-onwet technique; let the colours flow and mix themselves on the paper.

Once the first layer is dry, add details and define shapes by using thicker paint.

2

Soak your brush in clean water, then dip only the tip into the paint. This gives a gradient from dark values to light in one stroke.

I

started my official art journey at the Art Academy in Vilnius, Lithuania, where I gained my MA. After that I was a Creative Director in the advertising industry, whilst studying at the Sumi-e school of D. Doksaite.

I follow the ancient Japanese method of Sumi-e (Japanese ink painting and calligraphy), where the aim is to show the essence of the object, the impression not the semblance.

I paint simple everyday objects: fruit, flowers, berries and vegetables. I also paint sacred architecture: churches, mosques and minarets that I have visited on various trips. Their history, majesty, presence and

40 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

details continue to inspire me.

My favourite watercolour paints to use are Cass Art, Daniel Smith and Winsor & Newton. I love the butteriness and richness of Cass Art paint. My favourites are Alizarin Crimson, Indian Yellow and Payne’s Grey. The pigments are so strong, you just need a drop to last the whole painting! I enjoy the subtlety of Daniel Smith watercolours and the beautiful granulation, especially Moonglow and Undersea Green. Winsor & Newton Artists’ Watercolours offer both subtlety and stability. Their rich brown tones are my favourites: Vandyke Brown, Burnt Umber and Neutral Tint are must-haves.

A B OV E Pomegranate, Strawberries, Daffodils A B OV E L E F T Ibn Alwan mosque in Yemen

3

Create energy in your painting with splashes of colour. Load the brush with diluted paint, then tap the brush on your finger. A soft natural hair brush will produce a long drop shape whilst a stiffer, synthetic brush will produce round dots.

See Jurga’s work at amehome.co.uk or find your local Cass Art store at cassart.co.uk for more expert advice from their staff artists ▫

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Canaletto (1697-1768) The Church of San Giorgio Maggiore, Venice c.1740, oil on canvas © Manchester Art Gallery Bridgeman Images

Melissa McGill (b.1969), Film still from ‘Red Regatta, Venice’, 2019 © Melissa McGill Mazzoleni, London - Torino. Video by Giovanni Pellegrini.

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Canaletto and Melissa McGill: Performance and Panorama 16 July – 13 November A new exhibition celebrating Venice through the vision of two artists born 250 years apart Book now Thelightbox.org.uk

Artists & Illustrators_Canaletto and Melissa McGill_202x129mm.indd 1

£9.50 Day Pass | Lightbox Members and Under 21s Free

27/07/2022 16:26 A R T I S T S & I L L U S T R A T O R S 41

Husband and Wife, 1945, 85.7 111.8cm

42 A R T I S T S & I L L U S T R A T O R S

E X HI B I T I O NS

Milton

Avery Hi name is not well known in Britain but a new show at the Royal Academy is about to introduce Avery to a whole new audience says Adrian Mourby ▸

ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 4 3

Little Fox River, 1942, 91.8x122.2cm

B

orn in 1885, Milton Avery was a unique American talent in the early to middle years of the twentieth century. His works up until 1918 show the influence of French Impressionism. His later works in the 1940s paved the way for Rothko’s Abstract Expressionism. In fact, the young Mark Rothko was a daily visitor to Avery’s Greenwich Village apartment in the late 1920s where the great man’s wife, Sally would organise discussions and poetry readings fuelled by cigarettes and coffee.

Avery said very little, if anything, at these events but would sit in a corner sketching.

His output was prodigious, often generating a painting a day. After the financier Roy Rothschild Neuberger decided to back him in the early 1940s – buying up over 100 paintings - Avery gained credibility among major collectors. Prestige meant little to him, however. “He just wanted to sell some paintings,” says his daughter March, who is interviewed in the Royal Academy’s catalogue accompanying the first Avery retrospective in Britain.

This summer, the Royal Academy is devoting three rooms to 67 watercolours and canvasses by the man who they 4 4 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

Avery did not intend to be an artist at all, as the RA exhibition makes clear describe as one of the greatest “colourists” that America has produced. The term “colourist” was coined by the New York Times to describe Avery in 1981. “Only Matisse – to whose art he owed much, of course – produced a greater achievement in this respect”, said the critic Hilton Kramer.

But Avery did not set out to create innovative work in slabs of colour, works that would inspire American Expressionists like Rothko, Adolph Gottlieb and Barnett Newman. In fact, Avery did not intend to be an artist at all, as the new Royal Academy exhibition makes clear.

Born into a poor New York State family who later moved to Connecticut, Avery was pitched into supporting his nine female relatives after the tragic death of his father, a tanner. In 1901, at the age of 16, Avery began working at a local machine parts

factory in Hartford, Connecticut. After hearing that there was good money to be made in commercial lettering, he enrolled at the League of Art Students. Finding he had artistic ability, Avery moved to life classes. Eventually, the young man who never set out to be a painter won the first prize for portraiture and landscape.

Avery’s early landscapes on show in the first of three rooms at the Royal Academy reveal a young man hugely influenced by French Impressionism. Yet, it wasn’t until 1918 that he tried to find his own voice. It is clear from the exhibition that this experiment ended up producing a lot of muddy New England landscapes of uncertain potential. Fortunately, the artist persevered. In 1917, now in his thirties, he moved to working night shifts for an insurance company in order to have more time to paint in the daytime.

In 1924, he met Sally Michel, a 22-year-old Jewish art student and in 1926, they married despite her family’s triple grounds for disapproval. Firstly, he was 17 years older than she. Secondly, he was a Christian.

Thirdly, they may have also found it disconcerting how little he spoke. Sally’s income as a freelance illustrator for Macy’s ▸

E X HI B I T I O NS

Boathouse by the Sea, 1959, 182.9x152.4cm

ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 45

Seated Girl EXHIBITIONS with Dog, 111.8x81.3cm

E X HI B I T I O NS Blossoming, 1918, 27.9x 38.1 cm

Self Portrait, 1941, 137.2x 86.4 cm

and the New York Times enabled Avery to devote himself more fully to painting.

In the late 1920s, the couple moved from Connecticut to New York where the Museum of Modern Art had just opened, inspiring Avery with the impact of contemporary European art. His work was exhibited through the Art Students League of New York and he was fortunate that Roy Rothschild Neuberger either loaned or donated his massive collection to museums all over the world.

The Royal Academy’s exhibition divides Avery’s work between the early landscapes - which seem to lose direction after he abandoned Impressionism - and includes New York City landscapes which still have an uncertain muddy quality. Avery seems to discover himself around 1944. From the RA’s grey background wash displaying the early period, we are suddenly in a room of bright yellow walls where some of Avery’s very best work is hung.

Back in grey Room One, there is the sense of a genuine talent casting around for a direction. Suddenly and inexplicably (for Avery never talked about his work), in Room Two we have blocks of thinned colour representing scenes and people. Giving up painting anyone but himself, Sally, and March, Avery suddenly embraces experimentation in his portraiture.

His Seated Girl with Dog (1944) divides March’s face into two featureless blocks of

With his portraiture, Avery tells us all we need to know with a few powerful colours colour, white to the left and red to the right.

His Husband and Wife (1945) captures marital boredom, with a man and a woman seated at distance from each other with a wilting plant between them. His face is an Easter Island block of orange with a white explosion of hair above, while a pipe extrudes from a non-existent mouth. She, meanwhile, is a grey/green facial slab of colour as she tries to hold herself together, gripping herself with the outline of grey folded arms.

Avery could have completed the picture by giving the pair features but it is their positions relative to each other that tell us everything. The husband is self-importantly reaching for a match, his face flushed with self-importance. The wife is grey, a shadow with nothing, waiting to disappear. Avery tells us all we need to know with a few powerful colours.

In 1949 Avery suffered a major heart attack, but he continued to paint landscapes throughout the 1950s, his work becoming increasingly abstract. Compare his Little

Fox River (1942), an aerial rendering of a real Michigan view with buildings, trees, and people with Boathouse by the Sea (1959), which is just four irregular blocks of colour and it is clear that Avery has moved into almost abstraction. Only the title guides you to see a red sky as the sun sets, a blue sea, a yellow beach and, at the bottom of the picture, part of the roof of a black boathouse.

The RA’s third room encapsulates Avery’s last work. He continued to paint until March 1964 when he was admitted into intensive care to die nine months later.

There is a seascape in this room of just three blocks of horizontal colour that could have been painted by Rothko himself but there are also idiosyncratic images of a river trip on the Thames and scenes from Paris, reflecting the more glamorous life that Avery led as his unusual genius was recognised in Europe.

Avery died in 1965 at the age of 79 and is now recognised as a major influence on American and European art. Had he died at the end of the RA’s first room we would not be remembering him now as we do, but his late flowering in the 1940s was a remarkable achievement for a man of few words who simply wanted to paint.

Milton Avery American Colourist is on until 16 October royalacademy.org.uk/exhibition/ milton-avery ▫ A R T I S T S & I L L U S T R A T O R S 47

Adebanji Alade

The One Show’s resident artist and award winning painter tells us about five significant paintings in his life

M

y love for drawing and football exploded when I was six or seven years old and discovered the comic, Roy of The Rovers. I literally copied all the drawings in those magazines and never stopped.

In secondary school, I had two great art teachers who spotted my talent very early on.

They created a healthy competition between us as art students and we kept pushing each other all the way, trying to be the best at what we loved.

Then came the time for me to choose what to study in higher education. I wanted to choose architecture because that’s what my dad would have wanted. But then I lost both of my parents, which gave me the opportunity to choose what I would love to study. I was in no doubt it would be art!

I have not always made a living from my paintings, but I have always sold my work. I started selling right from secondary school when I would design valentine cards for the boys and girls to give to each other. I did portraits too. But it wasn’t until 2008 that I become a full-time artist.

Today, I make a living selling my paintings, from commissions, teaching in two art colleges - The Art Academy and Heatherley’s School of Fine Art - and presenting art documentaries for The One Show on BBC1.

My attitude to art has changed as I’ve got older. I have stopped rushing my work process, I’m more thoughtful and deliberate.

In my early days, it was about quantity but now, it’s about quality. These five paintings are a reflection of that.

48 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

I NT E R V I E W

Rush Hour III 100C MX80C M , OIL ON C ANVAS, 2007 One of my friends entered the Royal Institute of Oil Painters in 2005 and won third prize. I said if she could do it, I’d give it a try and so in 2006, I entered two paintings. I got some votes but not enough to be accepted. Still, I decided to go to the awards ceremony at the private view to see who won. I watched as the prizes were given out and said to myself, “That’s going to be me next year.”

I worked on paintings for about three months as I still had a full-time job. I entered a couple of paintings, and, to my uttermost surprise, Rush Hour III won first prize. I even got a call from the President.

That was the beginning of my romance with the Royal Institute of Oil Painters and I have never stopped submitting work, from 2007 until this day. Now, I am even the Vice President, which is unbelievable. It just goes to show that you should never stop believing in yourself. Every setback is a set-up for greater things to come.

Creative Progression

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10X46C M , OIL ON C ANVAS, 2017 This piece was exhibited at the Royal Institute of Oil Painters Annual Exhibition in 2017. It won the Alan Gourley Award for an outstanding painting. It’s a painting of me in my studio, in the zone, just painting like nothing else matters.

During these periods of creative progression, I find there’s no lack of what to paint. Inspiration flows, sales skyrocket and commissions flow. This is when I sing while I paint; it’s bliss. This season is epic and for the indiscriminate onlooker, it’s possible they’ll think you are a pure genius.

Enjoy it; it’s a season and like all seasons, there’s change. But I love this time.

Any time I have gone into periods like this, it’s almost always come from me attempting to get out of my comfort zone and venture into unknown territory. It’s happened to me being courageous and daring. Anytime I’m in this element, the creative progression is immense. So, my advice for any creative out there is never run away from your heart. If it tugs at you and it’s scary, it’s most likely going to propel you to greatness. ▸ A R T I S T S & I L L U S T R A T O R S 49

100C MX 100C M , OIL ON C ANVAS, 2017 Sometimes, all we need as artists is exposure. Exposure to the right people, person, body, gallery, collector, client or corporation. That’s my story of painting Chris Eubanks on The One Show in 2017.

It was scary as the guy was so hard to please. I wanted to do a small to medium-sized portrait; he wanted a large! And I’ll never forget the purple shoes. I had never seen a man in purple shoes and it’s the one thing he said I must get right.

The task was tough. I did the tonal sketches and oil sketches on the day and went on to do the final piece from pictures that I took with the studies from life.

On the revelation day, he was gobsmacked. He loved it so much, that he didn’t even want me to wrap it. He took it right into a black cab to Dorchester House, where he was going for another engagement.

I had made my mark and I have got many commissions and work from that single exposure that kept me going for a long time.

The lessons from these stories are to encourage any artist or creative to never give up. Work your craft and believe in it. If you are diligent, you’ll get your chance and, boy, make sure you are prepared for that moment.

50 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

After The Rain, London Streets

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Chris Eubank

61X 76C M , OIL ON C ANVAS, 2011 I was gearing up for the Affordable Art Fair in Battersea. I was out to make sure I did my best paintings in preparation for the show. I decided to paint a picture that would be a rain scene but not on a grey rainy day. Instead, I wanted a rainy day with sunshine, colours, shadows and reflections.

I also wanted it to have a few figures in motion. I would go hunting on days after it had rained whilst the sun was out. I was so happy when the perfect opportunity presented itself in Holborn. It was vibrant, warm and colourful. This is the scene you see here.

I was so happy the painting sold on the first night. Even though the collectors are not allowed to contact the artists, the buyer was so pleased with the work, she got a message to me saying she was absolutely thrilled with it.

It’s encounters like this that make me feel I have chosen the right path. Even though there’s been ups and downs, I couldn’t see myself doing anything else with my time other than enjoying and creating beautiful art that people love.

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The Buzz Of Kensington Church Street

76X61C M , AC RY LIC ON C ANVAS, 201 3 On Saturday 13th of July 2013, we had a great plein air festival in London called Pintar Rapido. The Borough of Kensington and Chelsea hosted up to 400 painters who registered to take part in this one-day competition. Roger Beckett, the founder of this event in London, got the idea from Spain.

The rules were simple. Choose a spot in the borough and paint it in a day. The artists all went to their favourite, chosen spots around Chelsea to work on their pieces. We were all to come back by 8pm with the finished works ready for hanging. All the works were to be on display the next day at the Chelsea Town Hall, where the paintings would be for sale and the winning painting would receive £1,000.

I went to Kensington Church Street and painted it from Kensington High Street. I won the cash prize but, more importantly, it was this painting that introduced me to The One Show. I was invited to go on to talk about my win, they liked me and so, made me part of their team. The rest is history. adebanjialade.co.uk ▫ ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 51

52 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

Coloured pencil portraits I N-DE PT H

In this new five-part series, JAKE SPICER will be exploring a series of approaches to drawing a portrait in coloured pencil, using a range of different colour palettes and processes

Cyan magenta yellow & black palettes

I

n the first of these articles, I’m looking at how to get the widest colour scheme from just four coloured pencils: CMYK, or Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black.

First of all, we must draw a distinction between colour palettes and colour schemes. In a coloured pencil drawing, the palette describes the starting pencils we select from our tin, analogous of the tube colours we might squeeze onto a palette in a painting. The colour scheme describes the expression of those colours in the work itself. In the portrait here, I’ve used a limited palette of just four coloured pencils, but the huge range of colours created by their combination has resulted in a colour scheme that is anything but limited.

Bright coloured pencils can be subject to rapid fading, so I’ve used Derwent Lightfast coloured pencils to ensure the longevity of the drawing.

Whatever range you’re using, your first task will be to select the ideal CMYK-equivalent colours – these are essentially equivalent to the colours used by an inkjet printer. Both coloured pencil names and the painted barrels of the coloured pencils can be a distraction from the exact colour properties of the pencil you are selecting, so focus on the tips of the pencils and how they appear on the paper when you make your selection. You will want to pick the most saturated and intense Magenta you can find – not too red, not too purple; a Cyan of a light, saturated blue hue which nudges further towards green than purple, and a bright, dead-centre Yellow that is neither orange- nor green-tinged. Test how they mix by making a little colour triangle with a colour at each corner and mix reds, green and purples. Pick out a neutral black and you’re ready to get started. ▸

In coloured pencil drawings we mix our colours on the paper. There are lots of different techniques for encouraging the colours you lay down on the page to mix together and in this drawing, I’ve opted for a dry blending approach, avoiding solvents in favour of a blender pencil with a colourless core. Rubbing the blender pencil over a gradient of colour will help to bring out the full properties of that colour, as the pigment is smoothed into a transparent layer on the white paper. You can also use the blender pencil to smooth the transition between two colours.

Step-by-step portraıt STEP 1 LINE DRAWING

Start with a line drawing of the entire face laid down in two stages: a loose, exploratory sketch establishing the scale of the head and the rough position of features, followed by a more considered map of the contours of the face and outlined areas of prominent tone. This will be the foundation of the rest of your drawing, so go away for a cup of tea and come back to check it with fresh eyes before you move onto the next stage.

STEP 2 MAGENTA

The magenta layer provides two things: it is a tonal underdrawing that establishes a base of midtone and it contributes to the warm colours of the face.

Don’t go too heavy with your marks at this early stage, but maintain a light hand, brushing the pencil onto the paper. You can always add little extra dashes of Magenta later, but it is much harder to erase early layers away than it is to add more colour to the page.

I N-DE PT H

STEP 3 CYAN

Next, use the cyan layer to add blue tints to areas of the face that need to be cooler, as well as mixing the colour with the Magenta to create a darker tone. Be mindful of how it will mix with the later Yellow layer, testing it on a strip of scrap paper if you are unsure how they will combine.

STEP 4 YELLOW

Of the three colours, it is best to add the Yellow last, allowing its vibrant transparency to unite the two earlier colours. This is where the colour scheme can go a bit wild, with greens, oranges, reds and browns appearing as the third colour adds a wide range of potential mixes to the page. ▸

ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 5 5

STEP 5 BLENDING

You can make a CMYK portrait without blending the colours but the palette lends itself well to blending. Running your blender pencil over the top of the three colours reminds me of the children’s magic colouring books, where brushing clean water over the page spontaneously creates colour from nowhere. Using the blender pencil selectively and firmly across the drawing will spread pigment over the page, allowing the white of the paper to shine through and revealing intense and surprising colour combinations as hues mix beneath the blender’s tip.

STEP 6 BLACK

Finally, you can introduce Black to add clarity to the portrait, extruding the potential tonal range of the drawing. I mostly confine my use of Black to the hair, eyebrows and eyelashes, with a few selective additions to the deepest creates of the lips and eyelids, but you’ll find that varies depending on your model and your own personal preferences.

56 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

I N-DE PT H

Features in focus: Hair The approaches you can take to drawing hair can be as varied as the potential hairstyles your model might sport. We express our moods and identity by how we cut, colour and style our hair, so a frustrating morning might find its expression in a bad hair day, and we might let our hair down to relax. In a portrait, hair provides a place for us to record something personal about the model, in how they have worn their hair, and to express something about ourselves and our

SHAPE

It is always important to establish the overall shape of hair early – this will help you to see the hair as its own prominent volume and not to simply think of the hair as strands sticking out from the skull.

FLOW

Once you’ve established overall shape, break down the complex mass of the hair into manageable flows. I like to use tonal marks, made in the direction of the flow of the hair to shape around the highlights. Let the white of the paper do the work of indicating the lightest tones.

TONE & TEXTURE

The key characteristics of hair are its tone and texture. In this drawing, I used tonal marks, made in the direction in which the hair flows, to build up dark shapes between the highlights of the hair. The texture of the hair expresses itself most readily at the boundary of the forehead or at the outer limits of the hair and a few confident flourishes can add a huge amount of character.

NEXT MONTH

Aux Trois crayons

INS T 2 R 7 ILS, U O IN F T PENC W E TO HTFAS 3!

C N HA T’S LIG AGE 1 C E TH RWEN TO P R O F F DE GO O

The bigger IMPROVE YOUR LANDSCAPE PAINTING The final instalment

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In the last of our landscape series, ANN WITHERIDGE shows how to create a large landscape painting using the techniques from the previous articles

n this last feature I want to bring all the subjects together from the previous four in the series to create a larger oil painting.

The more we draw and paint outside, the more fluent we become at translating nature and the more confident we become with our decision-making.

We don’t always have the time or means to bring our oil paintings with us and set up for a long project, but the small drawings, value and colour note studies can give us the

5 8 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

information we need to compose a larger painting.

The steps in this series laid out sequentially the process by which we can build up a landscape, making it simpler when we approach and compose a larger painting. There is so much going on in nature that there is a risk of jumping ahead to the end of the painting; having the clear steps in our mind helps us simplify the endless possibilities before us.

For this final subject I have chosen a view of Penn Ponds in Richmond. ▸

picture

SERIES ANN' S MATERIALS Oil Paints: Titanium White Yellow Ochre Cadmium Yellow Light Naples Yellow Ultramarine Blue Cobalt Blue Cerulean Blue Cadmium Red Alizarin Crimson Brushes Ivory rounds and filberts sizes 2, 6, 8, 10 Turpentine, linseed oil, Painting Medium MH PM2.

Tissue for wiping brushes

ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 59

Step 1 COMPOSITION AND DRAWING

We can do this in pencil, pen and ink or with oils. This step is key to making sure we have understood the landscape as a value study: setting down the proportions, composition, scale and the balance of light and dark.

I first toned the canvas with Burnt Umber and then drew the darks and massed them in with a wash of Umber and Ultramarine Blue.

I felt comfortable translating this sketch onto a large scale as I liked the composition and the various planes of the picture. With the luxury of time I will be able to build up more subtle colours and paint effects, confident in a solid and simple composition.

Step 2 COLOUR NOTE STUDY

I enjoy doing these little studies as they help me feel the mood of the painting. I like the challenge of reducing the shapes and colours I am allowed to use. It imposes a need for good drawing and colour balance; 60 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

we are looking for the average dark and light colours. The canvas is toned with Cadmium Red. For the painting I only used Cobalt Blue, Naples Yellow and Titanium White, while letting some of the red base come through.

SCALING UP

Of course, as we scale up a painting, issues arise that are harder to see in a small sketch.

These issues are greatly reduced having completed our composition, value and colour note studies.

SERIES CHOOSING A LANDSCAPE Having done many landscape sketches, we gain a much clearer idea of what subject matter appeals to us the most: large vistas, urban landscapes, painting by the water. It is important to feel inspired and excited about what is in front of us. When I lived in Italy I was always able to find the perfect hilltop town or pathway to a Tuscan villa. The more I paint, the more I realise it is better not to seek the subject matter but try to make the painting out of light and dark patterns, the colours and the paint effects.

Obviously it is wonderful when you have an iconic subject matter, but I prefer to paint trees and water. The painting works in spite of the subject matter, not because of it.

Step 3 EN PLEIN AIR

Having completed my value and colour note study, I took my large canvas to the field. Even though there are many artists who can work in their studios from sketches, I feel much more inspired if I am in nature, away from any distractions like admin, frames and the fridge! When I am in nature, I feel energized by my surroundings. I love the changing light of day which gives me the adrenaline to keep painting.

For the composition, I liked the strong horizontal of the water and horizon line against the diagonal path. I also liked the balance of the trees to the sky. On one level the painting is so simple, but there are also many planes to the subject, from foreground and path, to the water, the field behind, the trees, the distant trees and to

the sky. I wanted to try to add lots of colours while keeping the whole painting in a strong colour harmony, so that everything in the sky is repeated in the trees and water; we can create a sense of the different planes, playing with values, temperature, chroma as well as brushstrokes and paint handling.

I toned my canvas before I went to the field with Burnt Umber and Ultramarine. I painted large washes for the big value patterns of step 1. Having done the value studies and colour note studies, I was more fluent at painting in the composition. Once the drawing was complete in the large value pattern similar to step 1, I was able to key the sky, setting the mood for the painting; all the brushstrokes and colour notes after this need to be coordinated with the sky.

USING SKETCHES As well as using your sketches to scale up for a large composition, you can use them for other works. As I liked the painting just as a value study, I made an etching of the subject; I then added an ink wash in the first and a watercolour wash in the second.

TIME OF DAY If you are painting a sunrise or sunset, you are looking for a specific time and your window of opportunity might only be half an hour. Painting in the day, you can build up the information more steadily and get a much better sense of place. Nature passes you by as you contemplate the landscape. I like to paint towards the later shadow patterns and light. Have an understanding of where the sun will be travelling and how the shadow patterns will move. If you are doing your painting over the course of a few sessions, this makes it much easier to understand. It is important that, once you have decided on the subject matter and the value patterns, you don’t chase them, keeping to your original value pattern. A small sketch and returning to the same area will really help you with this.

FOCAL POINT Have a clear idea what your focal point is, both in terms of subject and paint handling. It can be the pathway or the trees, and in terms of paint it can be the effects of light, the paint handling, the contrast between the values, or the colours. It can be about colour harmonies or complimentary colours.

Be aware of what it is at the start of your painting. You might change your mind, but you don’t want to be chasing around after lots of different ideas and effects.

Ann Witheridge teaches landscape painting at London Fine Art Studios. londonfineartstudios.com ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 61

Hare

today...

The endangered mountain hare is a popular subject for artists, a creature steeped in folklore, myth and legend.

PENEL KIRK shows you how to paint one in mixed media

E ORIGINAL I M AG E

62 A R T I S T S & I L L U S T R A T O R S

ndangered wildlife portraits have formed the bulk of my work over the last couple of years, the sales of which have included a donation to various animal charities and their vital conservation work. The subject of this painting is the mountain hare, which can still be found in the Scottish Highlands and Ireland. Sadly, the latest research suggests that the last surviving population in England’s Peak District is at risk of extinction.

This species of the hare is larger than rabbits but smaller, and with shorter ears, than its cousin the brown hare. As the seasons change so does the colour of the mountain hare’s fur. In summer it has a grey-brown coat, making them hard to spot against the moorland heather, while in winter, except for the black on their ears, their fur goes almost completely white, a perfect camouflage in the snow ▸.

MAS T E R CL AS S

PENEL' S MATERIALS Fabriano Artistico Extra White Hot Pressed paper Paint Golden Heavy Body Acrylic: Jenkins Green Winsor & Newton Galeria: Cadmium Yellow Winsor & Newton Designer Gouache: White Coloured pencils Derivan Liquid Pencil: Sepia Faber Castell Albrecht Durer Watercolour Pencil: Green Gold, Brown Ochre, Burnt Sienna, Walnut Brown, Bistre, Nougat, Warm Grey IV, Caput Mortuum Violet, Dark Sepia, Warm Grey, Terracotta, Black, Orange Glaze, Cream, Cadmium Yellow Caran d’Ache: Luminance 6901: White Brushes Daler Rowney System 3 Synthetic Script Brush Watercolour Brush size 4 and 10 Foam/Sponge Brush 2” HB pencil Mono Zero Precision Eraser Pen: Round

ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 6 3

MASTERCL ASS

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2

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BAC KGROUND TEX TURE Using a foam brush – a brilliant bit of kit – I put a wash of water onto the paper. Having mixed a shade of green, I use a brush to paint a loose frame for the image, then flick the brush to add a few splats for texture. With a pipette, I run clear water down the paper to create texture and drips, then dry the paper and repeat the process using the liquid pencil.

2

SKETC H With an HB pencil, I sketch the image of the hare lightly onto the paper, making sure to carefully place it within the loose frame already created. The next step is to make a base layer of colour, using the Green Gold and Brown Ochre watercolour pencils, on the ears and nose.

For the darker area under his chin, I use Caput Mortuum Violet which gives a pinkier base tone to his coat. Using a brush, I soften the pencil marks and spread the colour.

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E Y E S AND E ARS I draw these using Terracotta and Walnut Brown for the irises and then soften them off with water. Using black for the pupils and lashes creates the first layer on his eyes.

With the Green Gold and Brown Ochre, I draw in fur over the coloured wash, being sure to follow the direction of the hair. The next stage is to use the Walnut Brown and Black to add the much darker contrasting hair on the inside and back of his ears. A Mono Zero Precision Eraser is something I like to use as it’s a great little tool for highlights to blend and lighten areas.

MAS T E R CL AS S

BUILDING UP THE L AY ERS Using a pencil, and then water, I add darker tones around the nose. I continue to add fur in layers of pencil strokes using Brown Ochre, Burnt Sienna, Bistre, Nougat and Warm Grey IV for the lighter tones. For the darker tones, it’s Dark Sepia, Walnut Brown, and Black. Looking very closely at the reference photo, I make sure the marks I am making exactly follow the direction of the fur which then properly brings out the contours of the face and skull. ▸

4

HIGHLIGHTS It’s time to add some highlights using Caran d’Ache Luminance in White. This I use as a layer to highlight lighter areas and for a bit of blending. At this stage, I’m also using Cream, Green Gold, and Cadmium Yellow to add glazes. This method is most commonly used with oil paints but you can glaze with pencils to add a soft layer of colour over another. This technique gives the initial colour a different tone and also adds extra visual depth.

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66 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

MAS T E R CL AS S

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C HEC KING VALUE S Now I go over the whole piece checking values, making sure I have enough dark contrasts and shadows against the highlights and, I think, this makes for a more dramatic and interesting image. Again at this stage, I’m continuing to apply pencil marks to replicate the direction of the fur and paying attention to the areas around his nose and mouth.

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WHITE GOUAC HE This is the bit I love and I think adds another dimension to the painting. Wherever there are highlights, I add hairs with a fine script brush and White gouache, an opaque water-based paint. Using glazes over the top, I then blend them in, leaving bright White highlights here and there, where the light catches the fur.

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WHISKERS The finishing touches on the mountain hare are undoubtedly his whiskers and the glint in his eye! Using a dark Sepia pencil, I draw in the many whiskers. Then, with sweeping strokes using the fine script brush and White gouache, I paint the highlights.

When it comes to the hare’s eyes, I like to add a strong white dot to accentuate the light reflecting in the subject’s eye. I think this has the effect of drawing you into the picture as it serves to hold and focus the viewer’s gaze.

For more information on Penel, visit: penelfineart.com ▫

8 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 67

Painting Arthur MATTHEW ' S MATERIALS

MATTHEW HAYDN JEANES shows you his tricks and

techniques for painting this greyhound in watercolour

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Paint Winsor and Newton Pans: Burnt Umber, Naples Yellow, Naples Yellow Deep, Yellow Ochre, Cerulean, Indian Red, Burnt Sienna, Cerulean Blue, Antwerp Blue, Cobalt Blue, Manganese Blue, French Ultramarine, Winsor Violet, Paynes Grey, Potter’s Pink, Neutral Tint, Perylene Maroon, Indigo, Davey’s Grey, Mars Black, Ivory Black Winsor and Newton Designers Gouache: Titanium White Winsor and Newton Colourless Masking Fluid Brushes Pro-Arte Brushes Series 007, various sizes including 1, 3, 5, 10, 20 and a 1” Flat Support Artistico Traditional White 18’x24- 140lb Artists’ Water Colour Paper by Fabriano HB pencil Royal Sovereign- Taper Point- Colour Shaper No 2 A selection of coloured pencils to suit your painting

68 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

ORIGINAL I M AG E

A

n interesting question is, “When does a painting of a pet become art?” It’s very easy to paint a beloved furry friend and proudly display it. But does this qualify? Or is this just a piece that means a lot to the owner, but very little to anyone else?

In these times of instant images with iPhones and devices, we can edit and change images and delete bad ones. But, even then, it takes an eye to spot an image that works. You have to be ruthless with your choices and toss out a lot of good pictures before you arrive at the one. I believe I found that image with this photo of Arthur, a great photo that I believe could be elevated by becoming a painting.

SKETC HING AND FIRST WASHE S As I am going to be using a full and delicate wash over the background of my painting, I need to choose a good quality watercolour paper. I need something substantial and capable of drying out well. An Arches or Fabriano paper at a good weight will help sketch out my image with an HB pencil but before I paint, I dust over the graphite with a putty rubber to remove some of the lead (it can stain the paint if left). Adding a very minimal touch of colourless masking fluid to highlights and whiskers, I then mix up a delicate wash of Manganese Blue with a touch of Cobalt Blue and, using a large round head brush (5 or 7), I wash in the complete sky area. While this wash is wet, I add in a little French Ultramarine and blend it in where I feel it is needed. ▸

S T E P BY S T E P

STEP BY STEP

2

ADDING COLOUR This image is based on very pale pastel colours and as such, using the transparent nature of watercolour helps you build some beautiful tints. Look deep into the image and filter them from the light tints first. I start with a hint of Naples Yellow on the dog. When dry, I add in pale notes of other colours for the shading: Rose Dore, a touch of Scarlet Lake, Venetian Red, Antwerp Blue and Perylene Violet. For the landscape in the background, I used Olive Green, Green Gold, Venetian Red, Burnt Umber and Sienna.

3

ADDING MASKING FLUID I wait until all the paintwork is thoroughly dry and start to add more texture by adding a further layer of masking fluid. Trying to achieve the texture of fur works especially well with this method. As this is a short-haired dog, I want the masking fluid to be used as a highlighter and give the suggestion of fur without painting in every strand of hair.

This is where I start to look at the reflections in the eyes, which are key.

MORE DETAIL Looking intently at your reference will pull up its fair share of challenges. Meet those challenges head-on, and one at a time. Don’t try to solve everything at once.

I’m moving on to the pattern on Arthur’s fur. The speckled nature of this presents its own difficulties.

The obvious solution would be to take a fine brush and cover him with lots of black dots, though this would be a mistake and ultimately highlight the dots over the dog. It’s a difficult pattern, so look hard and use a range of colours that blend and suit such as Indigo and Neutral Tint. Once done, you can blend in and take the emphasis off certain parts of the pattern by blending over the top with some coloured pencils.

7

6

REMOVING MASKING FLUID Once you are happy with your level of painting and feel you are near the end, remove the masking fluid and take stock.

Now is the time to start to blend and over-paint with subtle colours and washes. Remember, unless you are after hyper-realism, let the medium you are working in, show. It’s half the joy of using it.

70 A R T I S T S & I L L U S T R A T O R S

S T E P BY S T E P SUBTLE COLOUR The more times you repeat the previous stages, the more refined your image becomes. I am deliberately trying to keep the washes loose, so I continue to use a larger brush. I quite like a size 5 or 6 but we all adapt to our own preference. It’s best to let every step dry thoroughly to avoid colours bleeding into each other. This will also give me some lovely hard watercolour lines that define the medium so well.

5

4

DETAIL Moving on to the darker colours, I use some heavy and severe tones to bulk up areas in the face. I add strong colours, let them blend or puddle, and then move away to let them dry fully before repeating the process. This gets the strong colours to remain bright and bold. If you lightly build and build to a strong colour, they can dry powdery and lighter; this way keeps them fresh and powerful. Try to avoid black. Black can suck out the subtlety of a painting unless it’s intended to do so.

HIGHLIGHTS AND FINISHING Finally, I am going to think of any little detail that needs enhancing. Highlights in the eyes, a shine on the buckle or the tag, tiny hairs that may be catching the light. A White gouache will help you restore those. You can also add a little of the required watercolour into the gouache to blend in with the painting.

8

THE FINAL PAINTING Now my painting is complete, is it art?

Or is it a nice painting of a beloved dog?

That’s up to the audience. But if you have chosen your image well and painted it to your best ability, maybe one day it will stand a chance. matthewjeanes.co.uk ▫

9

ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 7 1

7 2 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

Dark and stormy HO W T O

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ight, energy, rising, dawning, fading, distance, breaking through… these are some of the thoughts and feelings I try to keep in the forefront of my mind when I’m painting a dramatic skyscape or sunset like this. It’s so easy to get motivated by the beauty of nature and as a painter, of course, I want to pick up my brushes and capture it somehow.

I remember when I was young, discovering the versatility of watercolours, sitting at the kitchen table blending pink and orange sunset skies set against dark horizons and being thrilled with the results. Here, I want to demo some techniques I’ve learnt for capturing the power of nature in a way that’s real and authentic.

This tropical seascape is a favourite subject as the frequent downpours in the evening light counterpoint beautifully with the fragile pinks of the sun’s last rays. The technique I’m using is one I developed for the final of Sky Arts Landscape Artist of the Year, where I had to make a finished painting in just four hours. It’s a shortcut to oil painting technique and one you can easily take out of the studio and on location. The materials come from the Cass Art Collection and I’ll introduce them as I go. ▸ ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 7 3

1

2

THE SURFAC E Before I begin, I want to talk briefly about my canvas. We often skip past one of the most important elements in a painting: the surface that we’re actually painting on. I like my canvas reasonably thick and well primed. This one is 335gsm, so it won’t give way under the pressure of my brush and the brush will release the paint to the surface in a controlled way. I always fit the stretcher pegs to tension the surface before I begin.

TEX TURE This canvas is Cass Art Artists’ Cotton Exhibition Grade Canvas – size 30 x 40cm. It’s 100% pure cotton, acid-free, with three layers of Gesso Primer, so I know it’s going to stand the test of time without degrading the colour of my oil paints. This painting is all about atmosphere and texture so I’m adding an extra layer of Gesso with a brush that leaves plenty of textured marks behind. I don’t want this surface too uniform.

5

6

TONAL L AY ER In phase two, blocking in, I’m still working in acrylic because it dries quickly and allows me to paint over and adjust areas as I go. It’s a technique I use a lot when painting en plein air. My goal is a purely tonal layer. I start by addressing the lighter areas, mixing the mid-tone grey with white and using a large flat brush in bold strokes, working impasto to generate texture on the canvas surface.

74 A R T I S T S & I L L U S T R A T O R S

COVERING THE C ANVAS There’s still a lot of blank canvas in front of me and my goal now is to cover it all. Only then can I see the painting as a whole and feel the balance and relationships of tone and composition. Mixing mid-grey with black for my darker areas, I complete the first block in and then make another pass over the whole surface to refine it without going into too much detail.

HO W T O

3

4

FIRST L AY ER For my first layer, I’ve set out three Liquitex Heavy Body Acrylics in White, Grey, and Black. I like to think about the type of marks I’m making in relation to the overall painting size.

For me, small to medium brushes equals a small to medium canvas, so I’m using the Cass Art Grey Synthetic Brushes for Acrylic and Oil set of 8, offering a wide selection of flats, filberts, and a fan brush for feathering.

SHAPE S Step one is my drawing phase. During this, I’m thinking about shapes and relationships. I might work freehand or use a guide to create strong lines and basic elements. In my head are two simple questions: “Where is the energy in this composition and where are the dominant values and directions?” I work to establish these early on as they provide the foundations I build upon later.

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PALET TE MIXING This is what my palette looks like at the end of this first tonal layer. Incidentally, I’m using a grey-coloured palette rather than white. This gives me the ability to see the colours I mix more accurately in terms of how they will appear and relate together in my painting. It cuts out a lot of missing mistakes and subsequent corrections.

COLOUR L AY ERS Heading into my colour layers in oil, I set out a selection of colours from the Cass Art Artists’ Oil Colour range. Some of these are regular choices, others are added to work specifically with this painting: Titanium White, Lemon Yellow, Permanent Yellow Deep, Cadmium Red Light, Alizarin Crimson, Cobalt Blue, Ultramarine Blue and Ivory Black. ▸ ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS 75

9

C RE ATING BAL ANC E The relationships I’m really interested in here are the balance between the warm colours behind the clouds and the large areas of neutrals in the clouds, sea, and sky. I’ve already achieved a lot of my neutrals in the underpainting, so my first oil areas are the yellows, pinks, deep red, and greens in the sky.

10

DEFINING STRUCTURE Now I cover all the neutral areas, pushing them either in a cool direction or a warm direction. These subtle shifts in grey are really important and they help to define structure while adding diversity and rhythm across the surface of my painting. If I find myself getting too lost in detail, I pull back, change to a larger brush and work over.

11

FINAL L AY ER Now that I’ve addressed the whole of the surface in oil, I let it dry and come back with my final layer the next day. This may involve revisiting the drawing, changing colour balances or being mindful of the relationships between textures across the surface of the painting.

When I get a sense of balance in the painting and a good connection with my original inspiration, then I stop. ▫

76 A R T I S T S & I L L U S T R A T O R S

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Send your letter or email to the addresses below: Post: Your Letters, Artists & Illustrators, The Chelsea Magazine Company Ltd., Jubilee House, 2 Jubilee Place, London SW3 3TQ Email: info@artists andillustrators.co.uk

M E S S AG E O F T H E M O N T H Fran Cambettie-Davies

A friend of mine had just bought a new house and having seen the series of murals which I had painted during lockdown, she commissioned me to paint a ‘flower festival’ to fill a blank wall. The thought of painting large scale again, was very appealing.

There was only one place to find inspiration: my garden. So, armed with a load of acrylics and 4x3ft

canvas, I went outside. What an absolute joy it is to paint en plein air as advocated in your magazine. It is so different from painting from photographs and computer screens. As summer is now well underway, I thought it would be nice to share it.

My friend is thrilled with her canvas. As Artists & Illustrators magazine has inspired me, I have inspired my friend to take up painting for the first time ever.

Paulette Moore

Coral Dyke

I’ve been painting for around 20 years, although only recently discovered the amazing medium of oils. I began working with water mixable paints, but once I tried Michael Harding paints I was hooked. I just love the delicious colours and the buttery texture.

At the same time, I purchased a few palette knives which I am using fairly tentatively. I would love to see an article in Artists & Illustrators which covers the different shapes and sizes, and how they are used to create different techniques.

[The Ed says: Look out for this in a future issue, Paulette!]

After miserable attempts at painting my flower beds this summer, I dug out the tutorial in your June edition and was delighted with the result. It finally drilled home to me that it’s futile trying to paint every petal, and a lot can be achieved through being bold and mixing many shades to describe the one flower. Thank you!

The writer of our “Message of the month” will receive a £50 gift voucher to spend with Atlantis Art, the UK’s largest art materials store. atlantisart.co.uk

Teresa Vanneck-Surplice

I have subscribed to Artists & Illustrators for years and as I live on my own, I really enjoy the variety of artists that fill the magazine. It’s pleasing to see the number of women artists you feature, too.

This week’s August edition is a really excellent read, so it has been a week of art and tennis.

I always read the tips and tricks even if I do not try myself. Still, I foresee a week of art books and reading your magazine in my garden. I look forward to receiving the magazine each month and so will be renewing my subscription.

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The Breakfast Show, oil on board, 30x23cm

Picture this

BELLA MARTINEAU won the Artists & Illustrators prize for her painting The Breakfast Show at the

Chelsea Art Society’s 73rd Annual Exhibition. She tells us about the story behind the painting

I have been exploring an idea of conveying sound in my still life paintings. The Breakfast Show evolved through a series of pictures about breakfast and the first sounds of the day: the radio, boiling water, a fry-up.

It’s very much a picture inspired by the loud, colourful characters on the Kellogg’s Variety packs. When I was a child, my sister and I would fight over which box we were going to have for the morning’s breakfast or arrange them into defensive walls at the breakfast table 82 ARTISTS & ILLUSTRATORS

– so we couldn’t see each other.

I started by mixing colours, balancing light and dark and looking for a composition. I also like to see the abstract marks build up to create an image with atmosphere, texture and sound.

The brightest square of the cockerel’s alarm call on the Cornflakes snaps out from the dark gloom. This is made by mixing Cadmium Red and Phthalo Blue. The cheerful Lemon Yellow crackles against the warmer yellow whilst the blues really make the painting pop.

VISION & STYLE

“Portrait for Misha Dubiaha”, 100 cm x 70 cm, Charcoal on Guarro Basik paper, 370 gr

WITH NITRAM CHARCOAL “My work in charcoal is connected to my vision and style as a fashion photographer.

It is the continuity of that line that allows me to exploit and merge both facets and that helps me to see things in a different way.

I love working with Nitram Charcoal. The quality is superior to any conventional charcoal.

Its strength allows me to put in a lot of details and strokes in my work. I love the range of hardness from H to B+. The grayscale offered by Nitram is infinite. Before starting to work with the charcoal sticks, I like to first stain the paper surface with Nitram Powdered Charcoal; I use a sponge and brush. And to finish, I love to play with textures and even use solvents such as acetone in my work.

In portraits, I try to enhance the gaze by conveying strength and evoke emotions in the beholder so that they can immerse themselves into the work. I leave lines and brushstrokes visible to give the work a greater power of immersion. Art is our most powerful weapon with which we can create a better world for everyone.”

~ Jose Beteta To watch Jose Beteta create this powerful portrait, visit www.youtube.com/NitramCharcoal or scan the QR code Video courtesy of Jose Beteta (Artist/Photographer), Misha Dubiaha (Model) & Generation Models (Agency)

Jose Beteta is Andalusian, a native of a small town in Jaén. He is 35 years old and is currently developing his professional work in Madrid. Jose began his training in painting and drawing academies. Later he deepened his studies through the Baccalaureate of Art. A few years ago, thanks to his artistic perspective, he won a scholarship for the International Fashion Master, which completed his training in the field of fashion photography with international publications such as Marie Claire, Harpers Baazar, Numéro, among others. In recent times he has combined teaching in his own painting academy and working as a fashion photographer. He is currently working on a large format charcoal series of fashion portraits. www.instagram.com/beteta_art | www.instagram.com/josebeteta_photography

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