After a successful Private View of the work produced from last years workshops at the View Tube, the Art of Growing began anew on the 20th of July with Emma’s portrait classes. First for practice, we sketched Barbara who kindly offered to model for everyone, and who was so patient she stayed in position for well over an hour. Everyone used charcoal in order to get the gist of shading and outline. Emma took photos of us which would be the source for reference for our self portraits. The following week, with the aid of a projector, we drew an outline of ourselves using the previous weeks photographs straight on to the canvas. We then started the process of painting using acrylic and brand new paintbrushes which were a joy to use. This week some of us who were struggling with the shading learnt the technique of turning the painting upside down which takes the attention of the eye away from the outline on to the detailing. Some had already completed their portraits,especially Barbara who initially without anyones notice began doing caricatures of everyone and once we realised we all had a good laugh!
