Upcoming Art Courses for the New Year 2021

Original oil painting by Lee Papworth 2020

The painting above is an en plein air painting which was completed over three sessions sitting in the Old Battery in Sandown.  Unlike many recent en plein air paintings I managed to finish this one in situ before the bad weather stopped play.  After having a lack of creativity flowing through my soul I had a sudden burst due to teaching in September and early October.  Some of the student's paintings from those classes can be seen below:

Original oil painting by Pam 2020

UPCOMING ART COURSES

4 week painting and drawing 'Dappled Light' starting 16th January 2021 10:00 - 12:30 at Northwood Village Hall - Course fee £72

4 week painting and drawing 'Dappled Light' starting 4th February 2021 10:00 - 12:30 at Bembridge Village Hall (possibly at Seagrove Pavilion) - Course fee £70

Start dates and venues subject to change

Original oil painting by Maria 2020

I look forward to seeing you at the art classes.  More will be announced shortly after this lockdown period.

Keep painting & creating!

Lee 🎨

New Art Course Dates - September 2020

Original Acrylic Painting by the lovely Geoff 2020

Buoyed by the recent success of the en plein air art course, I thought I would post the upcoming course dates for September 2020.  

4 Week 'Painting Tropical Scenes' - Northwood Village Hall starting Friday the 18th of September, 10 to 12.30pm - Course fee £72 - open medium

4 Week 'Painting Tropical Scenes' - Bembridge Village Hall starting Thursday the 24th of September,10 to 12.30pm - Course fee £70 - open medium

Both of these courses will have limited spaces due to social distancing.  I am awaiting news from both venues as to safety guidance.

Please use the contact form to book your place.  One-to-one tuition is available in August. Look forward to seeing you soon!

Happy Painting!

Lee 🎨

Original Oil Painting by the lovely Pam 2020

Student's Lockdown Art - 2020

Lockdown pebble art by unknown artists

Thank you all for your efforts over the past six weeks of doing the tasks.  I have been excited and amazed by your work!  Some of you have kindly forwarded photos of your work which are shown below:

Original acrylic painting by Geoff 2020

Original painted study by George 2020

Original painted study by George 2020

Original painted study by George 2020

Original acrylic painting by Cathy 2020

Original watercolour by Julie 2020

Original oil painting by Pam 2020

Original oil painting by Terri 2020

Original acrylic studies by George 2020 (above & below)

Original painted study by George 2020

Original painting by Maria 2020

Original drawing study by George 2020

Original oil painting by Jean 2020

Original pastel by Mandy 2020

Original acrylic painting by Maria 2020

Original painted study by George 2020

Original pastel by Mandy 2020

Original acrylic painting by Liz 2020

Original monochrome studies by Julie 2020

Original painted study by George 2020

Thank you for all your efforts - they are fantastic!  

As for courses, I may set up a small group course at Bembridge for those that have expressed a wish to return to the classroom in July.  This will be a small group in order to maintain social distancing.

For those wanting to return later I will be setting up courses as usual from mid-September onwards.  

One to ones will also be available most likely from July onwards.

Happy Painting & Keep Safe

Lee 🎨

This Week's Painting Challenge!

This week's challenge is to replace tone with colour.  

Find a black and white photograph that has lots of contrast (deep blacks, lots of mid tones and white) and then I want you to replace the black, grey and white image with colour as if you were painting from a colour photograph.  If you wish you can reverse this process, i.e. start with a colour photograph and make a tonal representation of it in black, grey and white.  
Either way you wish to tackle this challenge it will help you immensely to understand both tone and colour.  It will help you mix shades, tones and tints of colour (remember a SHADE is created by adding black paint, a TONE grey paint and a TINT white paint to your colour) as well as help you to compare the two.

For example, a dark area on your photograph (black or near black) could be portrayed as a dark blue, a dark brown or a dark green.   A mid tone grey could be portrayed as a mid green for example.  A light area could be portrayed as a yellow or a very light tint of yellow/off white.  

Your colour palette can be naturalistic in colour or not.  The choice is yours.  It could even be all one colour (monochrome) for instance dark red through to mid red to light reds and tints of red or all blue or green etc.  To sum up it is a task of matching a specific tone to a colour which has the same tonal value.  Dark, mid or light 

I look forward to seeing your paintings!

Happy painting & keep safe

Lee Papworth 🎨

(Images the property of Lee Papworth 2020)

Lots More Painting Inspiration!

All images copyright of Lee Papworth 2020

Following on from last week's challenge of finding surprising and unexpected images to paint, let's go one step further and look closely at the small details within a large object.  (See images above).  

A student got in touch with me this week and showed me her work of a lock on a door - it was big, bold and brassy.  It was everything that most students do not do on a regular basis.  Lots of work I see often appears timid and afraid, not so on this occasion.  So be daring.  Look for something that's sparks your interest, a tiny detail that you can enlarge into a large painting.  Have fun!

Happy Painting!!

Keep safe

Lee 🎨

Even More Even More Inspirational Painting Ideas!

Hello once again! This week's challenge is to draw or paint something that catches your eye that you might not normally paint or draw.  For instance, look at the wonderful shadow cast on the blue metal corrugated fence by the plant overhanging (the shadow looks almost purple).  Look out for things that surprise or interest you.  Look for the unexpected like the wonderful conical shaped plants below:

If the images above look a little complex, then why not try something a little simpler.  For example, below are some beautiful flowers growing in a wall.  The object of this challenge is to train your eye to look for beautiful in unexpected places to compose something out of very little or something very simple. 

I look forward to seeing your artwork of the surprising and unexpected images. Thank you to all those people that have sent me work already.  Keep them coming and remember art feeds the soul.

Happy Painting!!

Keep safe

Lee 🎨

All photographs copyright of Lee Papworth 2020

Even More Inspirational Painting Ideas!

Original oil paintings by Lee Papworth 2020

Welcome to week 3 of Inspirational Painting Ideas!

This week why not try painting the same subject at different times of the day (see example above).  For example, a houseplant on a windowsill in the morning and then again in the early evening, if that doesn't not take your fancy and you have a garden why not try painting a section of the garden at similar times (one in the early morning and one at evening time). If you are able to go on your daily exercise walk you could take photos of an interesting land or seascape at different times of day and paint that.  

You will be surprised and amazed at the difference this makes to the colours you mix up - although the hue will remain the same, the intensity (bright and dull) and the value (light and dark) will change.

Enjoy this painting idea or if you prefer, you could make it a tonal drawing challenge. 

Happy Painting!

Stay safe

Lee 🎨

More Inspirational Things to Paint

Watercolour Sketch by Lee Papworth 2020

Hi everyone!  Thank you for looking at the last post and joining in by painting various still lifes.  Excellent work :)

This week's inspirational painting task is to look out of any of your windows and paint what you see.  This could be a sketch like mine of nearby rooftops and garden fences, houses down your road with or without cars, a study of brickwork, a working sketch of perspective - in fact it can be of anything you see out of your window!

I look forward to seeing your work, remember it can be a quick sketch, a watercolour sketch, pastel or a painting.  As I said last time, the best work will be collected and put on the blog in the coming months.  Look out for next week's inspirational task!

Keep safe everyone

Happy Painting!

Lee 🎨

Inspiration for New Paintings

Watercolour by Lee Papworth

Welcome everyone.  If you are sitting indoors and wondering what to do - why not paint?

There are things that you can paint all around you.  All you have to do is look, better still observe.  Inspiration is everywhere! 

Original oil painting (close up of pepper) by Lee Papworth

Firstly, why not try a traditional still-life painting?  Look for interesting objects - shells, flowers and plants, fruit and vegetables, ceramics and textiles etc. Set your still-life up if you can using natural daylight or if not use a lamp to give you light on one side of the still-life thus creating shadows and light.   

If that does not inspire you then try something a little different with your still-life.  Why not cut open a piece of fruit, a vegetable or instead of looking at a flower from the outside you could observe and paint what is happening inside its petals (see example below): Try doing these on a large scale A2 or A1 there appearance will be more dramatic and stunning.

If this seems too much like hard work then why not paint a 'found' still-life i.e. crockery drying on the draining board, a pile of laundry, pile of books and a lamp (on or off).

These are a few suggestions to keep you going until next time when I shall suggest further painting inspirations.

Happy Painting, stay healthy and safe

Lee Papworth 🎨

Student's Artwork & Upcoming Courses 2020

Original acrylic painting by Maria

Over the past few months I have had the pleasure to teach several successful courses - 'Parisian Scenes,' 'Rainy Day Scenes' and 'Children in Art.' Each course started with some historical and contextual background - we looked at and discussed various paintings from other artists.  We finished week one with some tasks such as colour mixing, demos on how to depict rain and the human figure.  The rest of the weeks were spent developing the students paintings and the finished work is shown here. 

Original watercolour by Georgina

Original oil painting montage by John

Original oil painting by Gill

Original oil painting by Laraine

Original oil painting by Kate

Original oil painting by Pam

Original watercolour by Helen

Original oil painting by Jean

Original oil painting by Helen

Original oil painting by Meryel

Original watercolour by Georgina

Original oil painting by Terry

Original oil painting by Simone

Thank you to everyone who attended the courses and made them such a success!  

Upcoming courses can be seen on the last blog and more will be added after Easter.  If you would like to attend any of my art classes please use the contact form on the blog.  I also offer one-to-one tuition.

Happy Painting!

Lee 🎨