by Bev Dunstan

Jill Iliffe visited from East Hampshire on September 13th to present a fantastic workshop entitled ‘Painting the Kingfisher’.  Originally planned as an Oil painting workshop, the day expanded to include Acrylic paint to enable a wider audience to participate.  

Jill shared her insights into oil painting techniques including brush types – stiff bristle for the main application and finer brushes for the smaller detail; mixing mediums – Zest-it as a low odour alternate to the traditional turps, and Liquin, used to create a smooth, gel like paint film which was ideal for the eyeball of the bird.

Whilst some of the artists used the traditional Oil based paints, others used the water-based oil paints.  These paints still have the beautiful buttery texture that takes an age to dry, but wash out in water without the inconvenience of smellier solvents required for traditional oil paints.

Everyone came with their painting surface prepared with a background colour and the suggested palette colours recommended by Jill.  Jill brought two photo images to choose from and the artists began by sketching the outline of the bird onto the surface.  Once the outline was completed, then the remainder of the features were painted directly into the painting.

For those who chose the image of the front of the bird, the painting began with the breast, progressing to the head and the beak using different brushes to depict the feathers and the eye.  The tail was painted using the same brush technique before the branch was placed in the painting – this time applying the paint by palette knife – spreading and lifting the paint to give the bark texture. 

The final paintings were displayed and clearly demonstrated just how differently the same image can be interpreted and depicted by individual artists.

The six hours just flew by and everyone agreed it had been a fantastic day.  The biggest challenge left was getting the wet oil paintings home without smudging the paint!