Happy Easter – now paint!

Posted on 31 March 202625 March 2026 Posted in monthly meetingsTagged drop-in sessions, life drawing session, sketching group, social events, workshop

Happy Easter to you all, and let’s hope the weather is benign over the holiday weekend. A chance for you to get out and paint, perhaps?

Our month starts with the drop in event on Wednesday 8th, 10:00-13:00. I’m sure you know by now that this is a free to ‘do as you please’ event on Wednesday morning at the Community Hall on Hursley Road. I think it’s still with free coffee, tea and biscuits!

On Saturday 11th our Workshop is intriguingly entitled “How hard can it be?” It’s a Watercolour Workshop with Catherine Cartwright and I’m looking forward to finding out how hard it is!

The following weekend we resume our Life Drawing sessions (Sunday afternoon). The form for the next quarter was sent out recently, and has already closed. If you wanted to apply, please do so more quickly when the form comes out for the next quarter!

Monday 20th sees our Sketching Group heading up to Olivers Battery. I hope the weather will be decent for that. A new year of sketching monthly prompts will also be starting: these will now be sent to everyone, so just ignore those emails if you don’t want to be inspired. You don’t even have to do anything with your sketches, although if you want to add them in the Facebook Group, do so. For any help with this, contact Lisa Marshall.

A couple of days later, Wednesday 22 April, we have a social event, particularly to welcome new members, but everyone is invited. There will be an art-related Bring & Buy sale, and a clinic on presenting your work for exhibition.

And please note your entry form for the Spring Exhibition must be in by the 21st April.

There’s still time to do your Postcard painting – theme of Film Title, so you could bring that to the social too. And perhaps pick up some flyers to promote the Spring Exhibition to your friends and neighbours.

January Blues? Not here!

Posted on 1 January 202616 December 2025 Posted in monthly meetingsTagged Chinese brush painting, drop-in sessions, life drawing session, sketching group, social events, zoom demo

We enter the new year with loads of activity for you. This is partly fuelled by having two life drawing sessions in the month, the first this coming Sunday at the Dovetail centre, MR3. Details

The following weekend, Saturday 10th we have a workshop with Jean Turton, Jean is a recognised expert in Chinese Brush Painting , and participants have been given a list of essentials to bring, but Jean will be providing the specialist Chinese brushes, ink and paper, so all we have to do is listen, learn and paint.

Wednesday 14th January is our first Drop-In Session of the new year. A chance for you to get those painting materials out to keep your new year’s resolution going, perhaps? I shall be putting my new pencil sharpener to the test … maybe even turn up at the drop-in…any time before 1pm is your start time. Details

Saturday 17th is our New Year lunch, this time at the Concorde Club in Stoneham Lane. The menu looks exceedingly nice, and the company will of course be magnificent. Contact Lisa for further information: Lisa is at cfageventcal at gmail dot com

We are back at the Dovetail Centre the next day for a second Life Drawing session of the month. If you didn’t get your application back before Christmas, you could check if there are any vacancies, but usually, there’s a waiting list.

Our Sketching Group plans to make hay while the sun shines on Monday 19th, so let’s hope for a mild, sunny day with excellent light. Although as the last few sketching challenges of December were about shadows, light and dark, night scenes and so on, obviously our sketchers can cope with anything, anywhere.

We end the month with a Zoom demo, hopefully the one we had originally planned for December. But at time of writing this is not confirmed. So, Wednesday 28th, Elizabeth Hammond may or may not be doing a demo involving Life of Plants. Watch your email inboxes for final details and connection links.

There’s a rumour it’s Christmas!

Posted on 1 December 202527 November 2025 Posted in monthly meetingsTagged Christmas, drop-in sessions, sketching group, social events

It does seem to start earlier each year… carols on the radio on the 25th November with the excuse ‘it’s only a month to go’!

But here we are in December, and our public painting seems to die down as we gird our loins for 2026. We still have a Drop-in session and a Sketching group meet-up though!

The main event is our Christmas Social event on Wednesday 3rd, starting from 7 am. till 9.30 at the Dovetail Cafe. As well as special guests, there is tea, coffee and refreshments. There was a rumour of mulled wine until someone realised that the Methodist Church preferred not to have alcohol on the premises. Well, we may still manage non-alcoholic mulled something, to keep our tootsies warm.

Don’t forget to bring your entry for the Christmas painting competition (with prizes). They don’t have to be framed, just strong enough to stand on an invisible-easel. Also if you haven’t seen the ‘flora’ postcards we did earlier in the year, they’ll be on display too. Details

The following Wednesday, 10 December is our Drop-In Session at the Community Large Hall. Despite the pressures of Christmas, this usually goes ahead anyway. A chance to finish those cards you’ve been trying to get done before the last post? Details

Talking of cards, if you have some to send to the SO53 postcode area (our own), check out Scout Post, online or at many shops and stores around Chandlers Ford including the Co-ops, the Spinney 53, and Waitrose I think. The local scouts deliver the cards and you pay I think 35p for each. Cheaper than Royal Mail! Money goes to their Brickfield rebuilding fund.

And finally, hopefully Monday 15th will still see the Sketching Group out and about. Then there’ll be ten more days for your Christmas preparations. I have my first Christmas dinner on the Tuesday this year 🙂 Watch out for the invitation to our New Year Lunch sometime soon (and don’t forget to sign up!).

A happy Christmas to you all and very best wishes for the New Year.

Remember, remember the 8th of November

Posted on 3 November 20253 November 2025 Posted in Exhibitions, monthly meetingsTagged autumn exhibition, drop-in sessions, life drawing session, sketching group, social events

Yes, forget Guy Fawkes, November is all about our Autumn Exhibition.

This flyer is available for you to download and print if you want to hand it to your friends, or to post on your social media, or send by email to friends, whatever ways you can think of to get people you know along to our exhibition on Saturday and Sunday 8/9 November, 10 – 4 at the Dovetail Centre Large Hall. And don’t forget the Dovetail cafe is open on Saturday morning, too.

If you’ve entered an artwork, make sure to submit it in line with the instructions on Friday afternoon/evening (it’s dark now!), and collect it again (if it doesn’t sell) on Sunday afternoon from 4.15.

What else is in store for November?

Life drawing happened on Sunday 2nd, and will happen again on Sunday 16th. You have to be booked in for this. Details

The Drop-In Session takes place on Wednesday 12th at the Community Large Hall on Hursley Road. If you’re free, take advantage of this FREE dedicated workspace and get your project done or progressed. If you’re making something for a Christmas display or gift (or our social – see below), you’ve not long to finish it! – Details

Monday 17th sees another attempt by our Sketching Group to get out and about in the neighbourhood. The weather has not been kind for the last two months, but Storm Melissa should have passed, so maybe we’ll have a few settled days by then.

Wednesday 26th sees our last Zoom Demo of the calendar year (the art group year runs to the end of March) Elizabeth Hammond will be doing something about the Life of Plants. Details here, and the zoom link will be emailed to members a few days beforehand.

Don’t forget that we have our Christmas Social evening on Wednesday 3rd December. It’s Christmas, it’s social, there’ll be nibbles and drinks, and also, bring your artwork on the themes “Winter Light”, “Frost and Flame” or “A Touch of Sparkle” (your choice). You could win a prize! Details

And finally, our first Basic Art Course will conclude on 29th November. I’d very much like to report on it if somebody (or more than one person) would like to send me some thoughts on it, what they gained, and whether we should do another. With photos, if possible. Email to cfagweb[at]gmail.com

March went out like a tabby cat!

Posted on 4 April 20254 April 2025 Posted in Special EventsTagged fundraising, mayor, social events

Our Members social event on the last Thursday of March was very enjoyable, and we had an excellent turnout.

More than sixty people came when Roy counted, but a few had dropped in and dropped out again, and other arrived later, so it was a flexible and fluid count, rather like paint.

The Bring and Buy sale was full of things you really knew you needed, but couldn’t actually think of when you would use them. I suspect the donors had the same problem when they originally got them! The frames went well, and many were picked up, inspected, then taken over to the ‘framing clinic’ to see if they passed muster for the exhibition requirements. The ones I liked didn’t, as they were too small for the Hillier Gardens events, but would be fine on our invisible-easels for a show at the hall. Many people took the opportunity to acquire for a small donation, artists materials they’d seen in demonstrations, but had never used themselves.

The ‘framing clinic’ answered all sorts of queries about the group, exhibiting, papers, and other framing queries. It was really appreciated by us less experienced artists to have the chance to talk to someone not under pressure to receive artworks, and talk about the think that we weren’t sure of. Or were completely flummoxed. We are flummoxed no more!

Thank you to the catering team for keeping us supplied with drinks and nibbles, and to my companions for a lovely chat.

We rounded off the evening by a presentation from the Mayor, who kindly handed Roy and Gill the portrait of himself done by Adebanji Alade last September. We had clubbed together to buy it for them in thanks for all the work they’ve done for the group. We donated around £700 to the mayor’s charities. Thank you, everybody, for your contributions.

The Mayor then surprised us by giving gifts of flowers and chocs to the winners of his Christmas card competition. We had announced these at the Christmas social, but it was lovely to see the winners rewarded in person by the mayor.

We are planning to repeat this event on Thursday 26th March 26, so put it on your calendars now!

The Time of March

Posted on 3 March 20256 March 2025 Posted in monthly meetingsTagged drop-in sessions, life drawing session, sketching group, social events, spring exhibition, workshop

Yes, it’s March again. We seem set for a few nice days (once the frost has gone) so make the most of this week… who knows what storms are on the horizon.

What is definitely on the horizon are some painting and social activities.

Active art

The workshop (fully booked) on Saturday 8th is with Soraya French who will be working with Acrylic Inks. I look forward to seeing what comes out of this – it should be particularly vibrant.

Our Drop-In Session on Wednesday 12th (for members only) is celebrating something with a cake, and free! Roy says he’s going to do his postcard, so if anyone else wants a spur to actually do their postcard (mine got as far as reference photos, then I had to put the stuff away again) turn up at the Community Large Hall on Hursley Road around 10 ish. Times are flexible – you can just drop in!

Sunday 16th is another Life Drawing afternoon at the Dovetail Centre Hall (you’ll notice the rebranding since their open day in February). If you haven’t been inside since the new year, I can vouch for the extremely nice new layout.

On Monday 17th March our Sketching Group will be descending on Winchester. They had a cold day in Romsey last month, but still produced magnificent work.

Social Evening

Our social evening takes place on THURSDAY 27 March in the Dovetail Cafe from 7.30 pm. This is combining a new members introduction, a general social, an Exhibition ‘clinic’ to answer your questions about submission, and bring & buy sale. So check what you need to do to submit artwork to exhibitions, and what semi-useful stuff you’d like to hand on to someone else, and come ready to chat to old and new friends. You can also hand in your ‘Flora’ postcard if you’re ready (closing date for that is the AGM) – Details

Spring Exhibition 24th April – 6th May

Thank you to all the members who responded to the exhibition questionnaire – we have plenty of people wishing exhibit, and to be artists of the day, and volunteers to look after handing in, handing out and stewarding. If you need any help with framing, come along to the social evening (27 Mar) to discuss or even get hands-on help from the experts!

We’ll shortly be getting posters together, so when they’re ready, please give them to your friends and neighbours so they come along.

Workshops

The form for applying for the early summer (May June July) workshops came round by email last week. Don’t forget to complete it if you want a chance of a place at any of them.

Welcome to 2025

Posted on 1 January 202531 December 2024 Posted in monthly meetingsTagged drop-in sessions, life drawing session, sketching group, social events, workshop, zoom demo

Happy new year – although the Group’s year starts in April, so the calendar currently ends in March.

The year seems to be having a blustery start, what with fireworks displays cancelled and all sorts of festivities curtailed. I confess that I have no trouble with the lack of fireworks. Silent ones would be fine. I may even have a go at painting some in the coming weeks!

Possibly at our Drop-In Session, which is on Wednesday 8 January at the Community Large Hall on Hursley Road. I received a set of new drawing pencils for Christmas, so I may even join in to get started with them.

If you have pre-booked, then on Saturday 11 January Jake Winkle will be taking a workshop on light & movement in watercolour. We look forward to seeing what participants make of this!

Saturday 18th January sees our new year’s Social Lunch at the King’s Court Masonic Centre. This was a highly enjoyable event last year, but you had to book for it in December, so if you haven’t, make sure you do next time!

We hope the weather will be kind and the new heating in the church hall will be operational on Sunday 19 January for our first Life Drawing session of the new year in the Church Hall.

The sketching group is meeting on Monday 20th: meet up details are in the next newsletter. These don’t appear on the website as it is for members only. Contact Lisa Marshall with any questions about it (you can use the contact form on here to reach her if you don’t have her email).

And provided your computer doesn’t need you to upgrade your Zoom app yet again, make sure you are at your computers and tablets and phones on Wednesday 22 January for a Zoom Demo from Paul Berryman. This time he’s doing a portrait from a photograph in Charcoal/Pastel. Sign in details will be circulated to members about a week beforehand.

Looks like that’s another opportunity for me to use my Christmas present.