Tonal Values
GETTING YOUR TONAL VALUES RIGHT “Tonal values are critical. The lights and darks contribute more to the success of a painting’s…
Gouache
WHAT IS GOUACHE? The History Gouache is both a technique and a product. The technique, dating back to before the renaissance,…
Pastels
WHAT'S SO GREAT ABOUT PASTELS? By Serena Dawson Serena Dawson who hails from Ngunguru, says she has been asked several times:…
Monique Rush
SPICE OF LIFE
Monique Rush is an artist who enjoys painting a variety of subjects, ranging from landscapes and beaches, native birds, underwater life, Kiwiana to cars, (vintage, classic and new).
Monique studied art in college at Green Bay High School receiving 98% in painting and spent a year at Unitec Bachelor of Arts, from then on she taught herself. She says she has always considered herself an artist, as drawing and painting came naturally. “I have always worked hard in any job and art was my sideline but it is now becoming my main focus.”
Monika Welch
LET US BE ARTISTS!
It was the love of art and an inherent creativity that paved the way for Monika Welch, a former musician, to become a full time artist.
“I never had any formal are training and just blundered and blustered my way through,” she quips, adding that she did not enter the world of ‘art’ until she was 35: “It was New Year’s and my friend Julie asked what shall we do this year? Seeing as we’d both dabbled in writing and music I replied: ‘let’s be artists, and that was that.”
Lynn Sinclair-Taylor
MY OWN ART JOURNEY
"I have made my own art journey by putting into practice what I have read and learning from my mistakes."
“My jobs were always art related and it was always in the back of my mind that one day I would take my art more seriously. That day came when our youngest son started school and before long I was tutoring adults and children and painting most of the week. Drawing peoples’ portraits came naturally to me and I thought I might become a portrait artist.
Jo Chester
HOLD ON TIGHT
“Art enables us to find and lose ourselves at the same time” Thomas Merton.
“Ever since I can remember I have always been drawing and creating images,” Jo Chester explains when asked about her entry in the world of art, “I had a very supportive teacher at Rotorua Girl’s High who encouraged my talent and insisted that I apply to Wellington Polytechnic to study graphic design.”
This ultimately resulted in a career with art as the baseline. “I have worked as a Graphic designer, Textile designer, even designing jeans at one stage as well as drawing up fashion shots for a retail outlet.
Jan Thomson
BREAKING THE RULES
Recollecting how she first picked up a brush in her mid-forties after recovering from an encounter with the big ‘C’, Jan Thomson says “My journey into the world of painting began late. It was then that I decided that life is far too short to delay doing what you love, so I gave up my house painting job of 17 years and took up slightly smaller brushes.”
With a number of artists in the family, Jan says art was always in her blood. Why she avoided it for 47 years she didn’t say but once she started she was instantly and totally hooked. “I started with watercolours and then moved onto oils,” she reveals. “I learnt to paint by going out to Wellington’s (sometimes wild) south coast, wrestling with the elements and trying to put down on paper what was in front of me.”
Brian Looker
AN OPPORTUNITY FOR REFLECTION
When Brian Looker returned to New Zealand after an absence of twenty years living in Australia, it was like coming to an unknown country. It was the catalyst he needed to become a full time artist. “It seemed a fitting time, to follow my dream and make a commitment to pursue my art on a deeper level,” he says.
“It seemed a fitting time, to follow my dream and make a commitment to pursue my art on a deeper level,” he says. “For many years my wife and I had visited artists in their studios in many countries around the world, each time thinking what a perfect lifestyle they had. Truthfully the only difference between dreaming and having is that first step of doing.”
Stretching Watercolour Paper
STEP BY STEP - STRETCHING WATERCOLOUR PAPER If you have ever painted on a sheet of well-stretched watercolour paper, you will…