Betsey MacDonald: A Few of Our Favorite Things - 4 Week Watercolor class (Intermediate/Advanced)

Description: A great teacher once told me to paint what I love. We all have favorite things that we love to see, use, touch, wear, eat or just plain have! In this class, we’ll be painting those things. Students will choose their objects and will have control over each set up. Think of some of your favorite things like an old teacup, funky shoes, quilts, toys, utensils, even flowers, fruits or veggies that you love, all carefully placed on favorite fabric or surface. By painting from life, we’ll improve our observation skills and better understand how light, value and color can create form. We’ll master simple shapes and shadows using graphite for quick studies and watercolor for special, personal finished paintings.

Objectives:

• Carefully choose and arrange objects for a painting
• Improve drawing and painting from life Acquire skills with a variety of watercolor painting techniques Learn about clean color mixing and layering 
• Become comfortable with watercolor experimentation
• Develop an appreciation of watercolor accidents and how they can be useful
• Creatively paint from our own still lives
• Observe, critique and discuss student work and master watercolors

Materials student will need to provide:  Watercolor set (an inexpensive tray is fine but a set of tubes with palette is great, too), variety of brushes, masking fluid, watercolor block or pad (at least 140 lb, 8x 10, 12 x 16, 16 x 20 or a few sheets with a gator foam board for stapling or some other support or 300 lb paper which doesn’t need mounting, hot or cold press or even rough can work, jar or two for water, spray bottle, sponge or two, #2 pencil or mechanical pencil, paper towel. 3-5 objects that offer a mix of color, shape, texture along with fabric to sit them on and a box with ½ cut away.

Materials provided by instructor: I will bring my own supplies to share for experimenting.

Betsey MacDonald Bio