Anna Brewster
“Semi Abstract Autumn Landscape”
For our demonstration on Tuesday 4th November we were very pleased, and grateful, to welcome Anna Brewster who stood in at very short notice. Belinda Reynell was due to join us but was sadly taken ill – we wish her a speedy recovery.
Anna began by sharing that she would be taking us on an ‘adventure’! She is in her own words ‘obsessive’ about the Jurassic coast – the landscape and the seascapes. Whilst first and foremost a watercolourist she explained how, for the last couple of years, she has been thinking about abstract painting and is evolving her own ideas and ‘rules’. Thus, her sense of adventure in pushing forward and trying out different approaches.
Today Anna took us through her process for painting an autumn landscape. She was using Bockingford ‘Not’ paper and began by applying a wax resist layer using her children’s crayola wax crayons. These come in a range of colours with some appealing names! In this case Anna used predominantly yellow and orange colours working loosely though with firm pressure on the crayons.
The general ‘rules’ that Anna is adopting are all to do with balance in the painting, for example: dark and light; busy and restful; vibrant and dull; large and small marks; horizontal and vertical marks.
Once happy with the wax resist Anna used a spray bottle to dampen the paper before applying watercolour washes of Indigo, Brown and Purple. As these are opposite to yellow on the colour wheel they help the yellows and oranges to ‘pop’. Anna uses a variety of tools and mark makers to move paint around including old toothbrushes to flick and splatter while the paint is still very wet, foam and matchsticks. She then used a hair dryer to thoroughly dry the painting between coats. The next stage was to apply more darks which included using Quinacridone Violet. A red purple brings things forward whilst a blue purple send them back.
Where she felt the yellow was too strident, she toned it down with some ochre. A rough hogs-hair brush gave more texture to the final stages as did a further application of crayon, though this time with a much lighter touch. Anna made the point that it is important to keep evaluating the painting especially as it is so easy to overwork. Finally she finished off with some soft pastels as a top layer.
It’s always fascinating to learn about the materials different artists use. Anna’s use of a wide variety of tools and materials (including the Art Graf colour blocks used by tailors) was truly inspiring. I’m certainly going to reach for those old crayons untouched since my children were little!
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