by Bev Dunstan
Chris Church came down to Chandlers Ford from Buckinghamshire and provided a days tuition on the use of watercolour pencils.
He began the day with a quick introduction of himself and his work enabling us to see what could be achieved with minimal equipment; namely paper, coloured pencils, tiny brushes and water.
He chose to demonstrate the painting of a starling, with its deep iridescent colours of purple and green overlaid by golden edged black feathers, tipped with an arrow head of white, this proved to be an excellent choice.
The workshop progressed in stages beginning with a choice of two photos of the starling and sketching the image in graphic pencil onto acrylic paper. The pencil could then be erased at the end of the process and once the watercolour was dry.
Starting with the head, the next step was to apply the base layer of colour by overlaying the pencil marks before introducing the water to mix the pigments on the paper.
For those new to this medium it was very much a journey of trusting the method, since the early stages of the painting looked very rough and ready!
Working from light to dark, the golden wing edges were defined and the layers of colour continued to be applied. It was important that the brush strokes followed the alignment of the feathers.
Once the colour base was completed then it was time to sharpen the black pencil and start to introduce the feathers and the eye.
The crowning glory was the use of a white posca pen to mark the white feather tips and the method suddenly made sense!
We were all pretty happy with our results, despite having qualms during the session. ‘Follow the process’ works!
Chris was a patient tutor, spending time with the artists and sharing his tips with the members and also managing to finish his artwork.
Chris is keen to provide a zoom demo in the future. Our 2025-26 calendar is complete but he is ‘pencilled’ in for a session in the Autumn of 2026.