Over the next two weekends I am taking part in the Chichester Open studios event.
Our conservatory will be ably manned by Robin and he is looking forward to see people arriving to look at my botanical art which is hung there for the occasion. Whether or not the weather remains cold, you will be welcome to have a cup of tea – or coffee with us.
However, I will be down in the shed painting. Some people have watched the development of the Indian corn picture, which has only been done at open studio events or exhibitions. One of these days I will have to find a subject that is equally long lasting. But I know that several people have been coming on a regular basis to see the development of this picture. This is what it looked like following a demonstration in November last year.
Indian Corn in coloured pencil
Additionally I am also painting a Fritillary for a commission, so you might very well see me doing some of that. These are some of the sketches in my sketchbook .
Fritillaria meleagris in coloured pencil.
The commission is in watercolour.
I am looking forward to seeing you here. Don’t forget to tell me who you are and where you come from. Here is the link on my website giving you the address to head for: https://gaynorsflora.com/exhibitions/
This last weekend I had a very select group enjoying the peace and quiet of Bosham as well as individual botanical art tuition. The weather is gradually improving and picking subjects in the garden (the Magnolia) or in the vicinity (Eucalyptus), is no longer a trial. The following are a couple of photographs from the weekend:
There are more workshops lined up, the next one is Friday and Saturday 8 -9 April.
So many people have asked me to have a workshop that focuses on drawing and shading. Now is your opportunity. It is called: Botanical drawing and shading in graphite.
So what is it that you want to draw in graphite? Is it a delicate flower, some twigs, leaves or what is it that takes your fancy?
Many plants started flowering in January and even before, but surprisingly enough there are still plenty of spring flowers. I am surprised that so many daffodils are flowering and there are swathes of them wherever you go.
I’m afraid that the Magnolia really suffered this year. Its been trying to flower since the beginning of January, but with the recent cold snap it hasn’t been happy. As you see, one of my students at the weekend produced a really lovely picture. The tree normally flowers in early April and is hugely spectacular – but I doubt that we will see much of its glory by then.
But there is still a lot of last years plants drying out in the hedgerows and they provide very interesting subjects for graphite. Some leaves just have skeletal remains and these are really attractive.
Do get in touch soon to book your place.
Another workshop happening this year is in Norway, June 24 – July 1. If you want to save a little on this holiday, book and pay your deposit by 31 March. Go to the page on this website specifically dedicated to the holiday.
June and July is a very beautiful time of year to visit Norway and if you haven’t been there before, it is likely to give you a taste for more. That of course is in addition to the teaching – which I am told, is good.
Imagine being able to concentrate on doing what you love – or interested in starting, in the most amazingly beautiful surroundings. You will have a view over the Oslo Fjord and you will experience the crystal clean air and sparkling colours that derive from this.
Do get in touch if you have anything you are wondering about in relation to workshops in Bosham or the Workshop holiday in Norway.
I have just this minute finished downloading two videos to YouTube. The first one is fully accessible and the second is only accessible at the moment through the online botanical art course.
Obviously doing these videos is the best way of actually seeing how a technique is done and, they are easy to film. What is not easy is all the work that needs to go into refining the video so that people both learn something from it and don’t get bored.
Botanical art is painstaking and can take quite a long time. Each stroke has to be thought about before it is applied. It therefore takes time. But with a video, people aren’t interested in seeing you spend time thinking! They want to see you apply that stroke and if there is anything special about it, they want to see what you need to do before you apply the stroke – how you fill your brush as an example. Unfortunately that bit is in the second video!
Another thing that is a source of interest, is seeing the painting develop, layer for layer – but in a reasonable time span.
The two videos are based on the same picture. The first one is a demonstration of the first washes on the three shallots, showing how the under-layer can also start creating form. It then goes on to show the painting of two of the shallots using time lapse photography. A short sequence in the middle is done in real time. Here is the link: How to paint Shallots in watercolour – part 1
The second video demonstrates the painting of the third shallot in detail. I have shown short sections in real time, to guide through the techniques I use. The rest is the real-time video speeded up a little. But at the moment this one is only available to those signed up for the online course.
Before I forget to mention it~the botanical art workshop in April is Friday & Saturday 8-9 April and is called ‘Botanical drawing and shading in graphite’. You will find the details and booking form under the section on Workshops. I look forward to hearing from you.
The next botanical art workshop in Bosham is Friday to Sunday, 18-20 March. The topic is ’Spring is on the way: flowers and bulbs’.
There is a huge opportunity to paint almost anything flowering in the garden, but particularly plants with their bulbs. I have noticed over the years that people love to see a flowering bulb. Painting the bulb is almost a welcome relief from the detail of the plant itself. Also, the difference in texture between the softness of the bloom and the solidness of the bulb gives additional opportunities for learning.
What is likely to be around then? It is only two weeks away and there is already a lot out there. I have some Crocosmia Lucifer corms growing in the garden, which you are very welcome to use as we have too much. The way they grow is quite intriguing and although they won’t have any flowers on them yet, the green spikes of the new leaves will be showing.
There are loads of flowering bulbs at the garden centre, such as small Irises, late flowering tiny daffs and even Fritillaria. If you have any in your garden, more the better. I know that normally the garden centre sell the flowering bulbs much earlier than they pop up in the garden. The Fritillaria below is the result of one such example. I don’t think they have begun to show in the garden yet, but the garden centres are selling them.
You can use either watercolour or coloured pencil. A delicious lunch is served each day as well as plenty of coffee, tea and biscuits.
Anyway, I still have some places available, so get in touch quickly to book your place.
At last I have published details of the new online botanical art course. You will find information on the page of my website by clicking here: Gaynor’s Flora online botanical art course.
The course is based on six modules and is suitable for both experienced and inexperienced students. You choose your main medium; either watercolour or coloured pencil and I have made YouTube videos to demonstrate techniques.
Unfortunately I will have to limit the number of new students that I take on at any one time, but take on new ones each month.
I look forward to hearing from you.
As it is almost the end of Hellebore time, I will pretty up this blog with ‘Hellebore mix’ in watercolour.
I couldn’t believe it, but between us all we had enough dark Hellebores and Snowdrops to concentrate on the effects of doing something light against a dark background.
The intention of the workshop was to show how little work was really necessary on a white flower when placed against a dark background. Luckily I have some very dark Hellebores and one called ‘Slate’, that were still flowering. Additionally one of the students came with some that were a delicious ruby-red.
I was afraid that we might have to use the Leucojum that are still flowering in the garden, because the snowdrops really didn’t do too well and were almost finished – or finished off by slugs. The Leucojum normally doesn’t start flowering until after the Snowdrops, but this year started in December, before the Snowdrops. Weird!
I won’t rabbit on any more but show the progression during this weekend’s workshop. As usual it was a lovely group and they worked hard.
Painting like mad with coloured pencils.
This slideshow requires JavaScript.
The next botanical art workshop in Bosham will be 18-20 March when we will be doing ‘Spring is on the way: flowers & bulbs’. It would be nice if those coming to the workshop would consider doing the flower attached to the bulb. I think that botanical pictures showing what also lies beneath the surface can be as interesting as that above the ground. There are still some places available, so do get in touch.
In actual fact, I’m cheating a little, as I was going to write this blog this evening having spent a couple of days off from writing my botanical art online course, to sketch some Fritillaries in preparation for a commission in watercolour. But, I also got a query from a lady this evening, about the use of coloured pencils and how I choose whether to use watercolour or coloured pencil for a subject.
My answer to her and anyone else who asks ( as I do get the question fairly regularly), is that I have no idea. I just have a feeling that I want to do one or the other.
But, when I did my last RHS exhibit in 2014, I deliberately chose to do it in coloured pencil to show that solid subjects (crabapples), dainty subjects (blossom) and delicate detail (dissections), could be done in coloured pencil. The judges said they didn’t realise I had used CP and thought it was in watercolour!
Back to the commission; I had bought some Fritillaria meleagris at the local garden centre and Fritillaria Michailovskyi at Chelsea Physic Garden when I was there at the beginning of the month. I think we are innate plant hoarders! So this week I have been doing a series of small sketches in my sketchbooks.
Without thinking too much, I started out in a Stillman & Bern Epsilon sketchbook, realised what I had done (as the Zeta is better for watercolour), but continued in it, deciding to do my colour samples in coloured pencil. Although you can’t compare CP and watercolour by the names, or know how one colour mixes with another, I know the two mediums well enough to be able to convert fairly happily.
I’m afraid the following photo is not brilliant as I took it on my easel this evening, but I think you get a reasonably good idea of the results on the page.
Fritillaria meleagris in coloured pencil.
By the time I had finished these, the one dark flower I had was looking a bit faded as it was being subjected to being in the warmth of the shed during the day and outside during the cold night. I needed to concentrate on the foliage as it was a bluish green, except near the base, but felt I really should do this in watercolour.
I changed to the Stillman & Bern Zeta sketchbook. Shame they aren’t all in the same one – but never mind! I had hacked (dissected) the one flower to pieces and done one or two small sketches, so decided to draw a portrait of the bulbs. In the end, all of the sketches on the 2nd page are watercolour over graphite. The bulb is from the Fritillaria meleagris, but you also see the Fritillaria Michailovskyi. I have taken a photo of that one halfway through so you can see the amount of graphite shading I actually did. Before adding colour, I did a wash of clear water to ‘set’ the graphite so it wouldn’t discolour the colours I was going to use.
I am so excited. I got a letter in the post today to tell me that my first picture has been accepted by the Chelsea Garden Florilegium, without needing to be adjusted in any way. On top of that, the comments from the Kew Botanists who evaluated the work, were pretty good too – that made the acceptance even more special.
I applied to and was accepted as a member of the Chelsea Physic Garden Florilegium in the middle of last year; full membership is limited making membership even more exciting. The intention of membership is to document all the plants that are in the Chelsea Physic Garden. As you can imagine, there are thousands, so it will take a long time.
For the privilege of being a full member, everyone is meant to submit a picture each year, of one of the plants in the garden. Of course, a plant needs to be chosen that is not already in the archives. As I became a member half-way through the year I was in reality excused from painting a picture until 2016, but those who know me know I like a challenge.
I painted the Fuchsia microphylla. As the name suggests the leaves are minuscule, as are the flowers, although I was surprised by the size of the fruit. Except for the pen & ink habit drawing, which is life-size, the rest of the painting is on a larger scale. Once the scale of anything is increased, the colours become much more intense. Anyone who has looked through a microscope to see the detail of grey-looking grass, will know how intense the multitude of colours is in reality. The Fuchsia microphylla was painted enlarged because it was so tiny and I wanted to convey its real beauty.
I have posted the picture before, but here it is again, now as part of the archives of the Chelsea Physic Garden.
Fuchsia microphylla from Chelsea Physic Garden, in watercolour with ink.
In reality the workshop became textures , bark, lichen and leaves!
In the end, I felt it had been a very unusual workshop because four of the five students were coloured pencil artists and only one was a watercolour artist. Three of the CP students wanted to do graphite only instead of colour, to improve their tonal value skills as well as the use of graphite. The watercolour student wanted to improve ‘green’ skills. They were definitely students who knew what they wanted to do! Their intention was to improve various aspects of their skills in botanical art and it was such a pleasure – and honour to help them.
On the first day we focused a lot on preparation. This time we didn’t actually talk very much about composition, but we went through the first stages of drawing and making a rough tonal value reference drawing.
LichenBroken piece of BirchDrawing wood and lichenDrawing piece of wood found on the beach.
As well as the different drawing techniques, we also looked at light and shade forming a solid object, and mixing greens. Unfortunately not all of the photographs turned out too well, but I think you will appreciate some of the results anyway.
Dried oak leavesThe piece if wood with lichen
Of course the various types of lichen we had collected between us was worthy of more detailed investigation, so out came all the magnifying glasses and lenses that we could muster. The specimens were hugely intriguing and the colours definitely became accentuated when you see them in detail.
I was particularly pleased with the results and I am just sorry that the photograph of the CP picture did not do it justice. I’m afraid the light was failing when I took the picture, but the tiny detail of the lichen was actually very well done – and exhausting to do. It will obviously take time to finish that piece even though it is small. I hope that the artist will not lose patience with it and complete it at some point so that it can be shown again on the blog. I think the other photographs of the work have turned out reasonably well.
GAYNOR'S FLORA 