Bosham

Chichester Art Trail

| Gaynor's Flora

The Chichester Art Trail happens every May and generally includes Bank holiday Monday in the first weekend. That is what has happened this year too and we are again open to the public.

Essentially the criteria for this art trail is that you open your studio to the public so that everyone can see you at work. Unfortunately this doesn’t always happen. And, in fact I am told that very few people are actually working at their art. Therefore , it seems that people are very pleased when they arrive at our ‘venue’ (sounds a pretentious word doesn’t it?). That’s why I call the shed the shed – because it is and was a shed. Actually, it was a loose box, so a shed is an upgrade. But as ever I am off on a tangent.

We have had a steady trickle of people since Friday evening. We, and the other artists in Bosham, had a Pimms preview evening for people who live in Bosham.  It was quite tough getting everything ready in time, but it was fun once we got there. The people of Bosham did as requested and either turned up on their bikes or ‘Shank’s pony’. For those who are not English, this means ones own two legs.

The first day – Saturday- went well enough once everyone had got their weekend shopping out of the way. The weather has been absolutely supper. The sun has been shining and it is very pleasant. This means I have been able to sit working in the shed with the door open ready for visitors. Yesterday went very well. In fact the first Sunday is usually the best day of the two weekends. With any luck, in writing this the statement will prove me wrong.

In Bosham there are 15 artists in 11 locations – which tells you that those who share are not able to show their own working environment. As one can’t go any further than the sea when getting to see us (we are about 200 metres from the inlet), we are the last one on the Bosham part of the trail.  This means that many drop off the trail before getting to us as there is so much of interest on the way – that is unless they have specifically chosen our place.  However, we still get a few who want to see as many artists as they can and that gives me a real opportunity to get people interested in botanical art.

Our set-up is that we have a gallery of my pictures in the conservatory (where I normally have workshops). My husband mans this area as he loves talking to the people that come. I am working in the shed so that people can see what I do and ask as many questions as they want to. Mulling over the questions I have had, perhaps I have chosen the wrong medium that I am using in the shed. I chose to do some purple irises in watercolour as I haven’t used that medium in a whole painting for some time.

The conservatory (Gallery for the day)contains the RHS Silver Gilt medal Crab apple series, which is in coloured pencil and attracts a lot of attention, but also some of the Magnolia x soulangeana series in watercolour that I did as an RHS exhibit in 2011. Visitors are astounded when my husband tells them that the crab apple series is in coloured pencil and therefore they are asking about the coloured pencils all the time. There seems to be less of a thrill about watercolour, although a fair amount of interest as to how I achieved the iridescent purple of the Irises.

Visitors do love to see the artists working environment and ask questions about how they do things. That is why it is a shame to hear that very few make themselves available to do this.

Before I finish this blog, there are two things I must mention. The open studios art trail is open next Saturday and Sunday between 10:30 and 17:30. You can find my address on my website: http://www.gaynorsflora.com . Additionally, I have places on my next workshop ‘A page of flower heads from the garden’ – May 29th – 31st. Now I am going to show one or two pictures of my working environment and on another occasion I will show you what I have been working on this weekend and the ‘gallery’ in the conservatory where

My workspace - in the 'shed'
My workspace – in the ‘shed’
The shed!
The shed!
At work.
At work.

I have the workshops.

Open studios and open invite

| Gaynor's Flora

Very briefly I will mention the workshop at Goodnestone Park Gardens. As always they are lovely hosts and we had a large airy room to do the workshop.

The workshop went well and again there were some lovely students who worked really hard. I noticed that by the end of the first day they wondered what their results would be like, but at the end of the two days all were happy with their work and felt they had learnt something new.

Unfortunately, I forgot to take any photos to embellish this page, so you will have to imagine deep red Peonies, clematis and Wisteria. None of which are simple plants.

At the moment there is a mess all round me. This weekend we are taking part in the Chichester Art trail. Essentially, it is open studios. Here in Bosham there is quite an enclave of artists, so many people choose to spend one day in this area. Bosham is a lovely place anyway and we do have a lot of visitors generally. This is an extra good excuse to visit the area.

As usual we are setting up a gallery in the house, but I will also be working in the studio. This usually attracts many questions and people who were not initially interested in botanical art, have succumbed. I don’t think I have talked them into the ground, but many have obviously become interested in a subject they knew little about before.

Anyway, I don’t think you want any pictures of this mess until it’s been sorted out and pictures hung where they are meant to be. If you have the opportunity, I do hope you will plan a trip to Bosham either this weekend (which includes the Monday bank holiday) , and next Saturday and Sunday, it will be 10:30-17:30 each day.

In the village there will be loads of signs and balloons marking the spot. I am number 14, so you just need to follow the signs.

See you here!

Completion of a good workshop

| Gaynor's Flora

For the last two days I have been running a workshop with the title of Spring Bulbs. I have already commented how out of place that title was. However, it was still a good group who found suitable botanical subjects to paint.

The coloured pencil artists outnumbered the watercolour ones, but I was very grateful for being able to use my brushes having concentrated so much on coloured pencils recently.

As a group we had great fun. Everyone got on well together and were encouraging to each other. We had plenty of lovely weather, warm and sunny. But, the sun moves and the warmth affects the plants!!

Aren’t we hopeless, we want the sun – to stand still and in the right place; we want the warmth – at just the right time and the right temperature; we want to paint living plants – that act dead, but look alive!! We are impossible beings.

This is the lovely group.

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Now the results. These came from people who hadn’t before, through to those with good experience. I am very pleased with the results . Thank you to everyone who allowed me to show their work. By the way. Notice that one of the pictures is actually done twice. The artist did it first, then decided to do it again incorporating what she had learnt. She (and I) were well pleased.

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The next workshop will be Thursday 29 – Saturday 31 May. Have a look on http://www.gaynorsflora.com, on the Tuition page. I hope to see you here in Bosham then.

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16 days until the RHS botanical art exhibition set up.

| Gaynor's Flora

I have spent the day Photoshopping the Crab apple pictures and there is another glimpse at the end of this blog.

But this evening I was at a meeting with my Bosham artist colleagues. The Chichester open Studios art trail is during the first two weekends in May, this will include the bank holiday Monday.

In the beautiful village of Bosham lives a whole enclave of artists using different media. We are going to start the art trail a little early on Friday 2 May with a preview at each of the artist’s studios. This will be between. 17:00 to 20:00.

Hopefully, people living in the vicinity will get the opportunity to see what is on display in a relaxing environment. More about this soon.

Tomorrow and for a further two days, I will be teaching the workshop ‘From sketch to drawing – learn to draw botanical images’.

So many have problems with their initial drawings and plans for their botanical paintings. Unfortunately, it is often the case that one finds out by having experienced it, that the final painting will only be as good as the line drawing. Those on the workshop have already understood this and hope to improve their drawing skills.

But, this is another part of Malus Evereste.

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Next Botanical Art workshop – Hellebores

| Gaynor's Flora

The next workshop is February 28th – March 2nd. That is Friday, Saturday and Sunday. The topic suggestion is Hellebores.

Many will have seen Hellebores and snowdrops
poking their heads up in the garden already – as long as their gardens are not underwater.

I feel so sorry for all those people who are struggling in the UK, because of the wind and rain. I am so grateful to have been spared and can only imagine what they are going through.

Back to Hellebores and the botanical art workshop. I have one or two places available on the workshop and it is suitable for those who want to start painting botanically, to those who are already fairly well accomplished. You can use watercolour, coloured pencil or graphite and as the class is kept deliberately small I will be able to give individual attention to everyone.

The workshop is held in the beautiful village of Bosham, near Chichester on the South coast of England. Beautiful even now!

Can I tempt you with one or two pictures from my garden this week?

Do get in touch via this blog or my website http://www.gaynorsflora.com if you want to take part in the workshop or make any comments.

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First botanical art workshop in 2014, 16-17 January

| Gaynor's Flora

Happy New year and plenty of botanical art.

I have two workshops in January, in Bosham Nr. Chichester. The first is ‘Colour mixing in Botanical art with Coloured pencil’ and the second is the same theme only using watercolour.

The first workshop is for anyone interested in working with coloured pencil if they already do so, or they would like to learn. Therefore it will be a good one both for new beginners and experienced.

We have all had the same problem now and again haven’t we, that we just can’t mix the right colour ? Well this workshop will be focusing on how to get it right. Getting the right depth of colour with coloured pencil is a matter of mixing the colours optically on the paper. We don’t always have the right colour to hand and, if we did, it is likely to be flat and boring without depth to it. Come and learn how to do it.

Thursday and Friday 16-17 January between 10:00-16:00. Get in touch via my website gaynorsflora.com. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

This is a snippet from that on which I am working towards the RHS exhibition in April. It is in coloured pencil:

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A very busy few weeks

| Gaynor's Flora

A busy time. I demonstrated at the Society of Floral painters exhibition at the Oxmarket in Chichester, twice. Once with coloured pencils and once with watercolour. People were interested in both and seemed to like my results. However, there is a huge fascination for the coloured pencils. There were lots of comments about how they didn’t realise what could be achieved with them. I love working with them, but also enjoy watercolour.

Since the exhibition, I have had my normal weekly classes and spent a few days in Amsterdam with my children. That of course was enjoyable. We came back on Saturday and I went off to Goodnestone Park gardens on Monday, teaching a botanical art workshop for Field Breaks. It seemed to go well, some returning students and over half using coloured pencil.

I think I will have to write a separate blog on coloured pencil and future plans.

Today I am starting another workshop over three days in Bosham. Again over half are returning students.