Painting

Welcome to the Painting classroom. While we might be best know for our quiltmaking, drawing and painting are, and have always been, fundamental to our practice. 

Our aim here in the classroom is to encourage painting, make it accessible and practical to all. To that end, we’ll be focussing on waterbased products, watercolour, gouache and acrylic. These versatile media provide endless scope for experimentation and personal development. 

Video Workshops

Watercolour Flower Painting

Join Linda for a step-by-step demonstration of painting flowers. She'll show you how to control washes of watercolour and build layers to paint your subject. See how an underdrawing is successfully integrated into your painting and how to manage the flow of paint and lift out colour where necessary. Even if you've never painted with watercolour before, Linda will help you achieve great results.

Painting Birds

Birds are such an inspiration to us, whether it's big black crows in the fields, or the pretty garden birds that visit the feeders outside the studio. In this collection of workshops Linda will show you her methods for painting birds using acrylics on wooden panel and canvas. Suitable for beginners or the more experienced artist, Linda will guide you through, step by step.

Inktense Traced Print

Drawing is often the best way to start a watercolour, acrylic or mixed media painting, but what if you you feel your drawing skills aren't strong, or maybe you just want a fast and effective way to get your image down on paper so you can quickly get started with your painting? In this workshop Linda will demonstrate her technique for creating that drawing which will be the perfect foundation for your painting. 

Working with Inktense

Do you have a set of Derwent Inktense pencils, or blocks? In this collection of videos we'll demonstrate a diverse approach to using them in your work on paper and fabric. See how to make rubbings, use them to colour fabric, add colour to your altered books and even print with them. There are four workshops in this collection.

Ink Painting

In this collection you'll find a selection of workshops exploring the use of ink. We'll show you how you can combine acrylic ink and acrylic paint, use gouache as a resist for Indian ink, and make mixed media drawings with watercolour pencils and writing ink.

Mixed Media Painting: Collage Panel

Try your hand at creating a mixed media painting. Using a wooden panel, canvas or piece of card as a base, build up layers of collage, acrylic paint and drawing to complete your work. Laura will guide you through every step in detail, including how to apply layers of glazes with acrylic paint for richness of colour and luminosity.

Working with Acrylic Skins

Using acrylic skins is a fascinating way to add linear and text detail to your acrylic painting and mixed media projects. Join Laura to see how to trace a linear design, how to form the skin and how to use it. In the second video in this collection she'll show you how to apply the principle to text based designs.

Mixed Media: Digital/Paint

Explore the potential of combining real paint with digital techniques. In this video collection Laura will guide you through acrylic painting with sgraffito, digital sgraffito using Procreate on the iPad, and working with printed digital paintings adding further layers of paint and detail.

Serendipity Painting

Are you always nervous about getting started in a new sketchbook? Do the pristine pages scare you? Let me reassure you that you're not alone! In this collection of three videos you'll learn how to lose the blank, white page quickly and easily. Laura shows how she gets lots of glorious colour on her pages using water based paints, drawing inks and soluble pastels. She demonstrates step by step how she produces fascinating background effects for her sketchbook and art journaling work and how she constantly evaluates and responds to what she's created on the page.

Painterly Landscape

In this video collection Linda demonstrates exactly how she uses a combination of acrylic paints and inks to create simple little landscapes on watercolour paper and box canvases before developing the same theme into fabric and thread. She produces several decorative, paintings and panels that would be perfect in your own home or would make great gifts. The videos include everything you need to know to create your own landscapes in a variety of formats.

Digital Painting and Tracing

Use your iPad as a design tool. Learn how you can easily digitally trace and paint. Print your digital work to paper and incorporate it into your sketchbook.

Other resources

Stretching Paper

Learn how to combine hand painting with your quilting (either digitally stitched or free motion) as an exciting way to introduce colour and pattern to your quilts. 

BP Portrait Award 2018

Join Linda to get a taste of the 2018 BP Portrait Award exhibited at Wolverhampton Art Gallery until November 30th.

Watercolour Paint Palette Basics

Linda's often asked about her choice of watercolour paints - discover her recommendations for a basic starter palette here.

The power of the complement

Linda’s talking about the effectiveness of complementary colours in painting or quilts.

Drawing and Painting

Linda's enjoying more sketchbook drawing and painting today. With spring in the air the garden provides the inspiration.

Art Kit Essentials

Laura's art kit essentials for sketchbook working on the go.

Organise your Stuff

Organise your stuff, make it pretty, use it up!