canvas painting

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Overcome the Overwhelm When Starting A Painting with this Simple Process

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Overcome the Overwhelm When Starting A Painting with this Simple Process

This video will give you 2 techniques for getting started when you have a new canvas, that is fast and effective and will help to kickstart your creative process so that you can begin your painting easily and with beautiful and exciting results.

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Finding Direction in Abstract Painting

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Finding Direction in Abstract Painting

Last week you would have watched about the breakthrough and moving ahead with my paintings. And suddenly, this painting is taking me on a very bumpy journey - and you're all coming along for the ride!

At the moment, what it means to me is that this painting will be rich in layers, have AMAZING texture, and is taking longer to reveal itself... that's all. I can't describe the process, I'll just leave you to watch me making some very dubious decisions.

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The First Layers

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The First Layers

This video shows the process of creating the first few layers of one of my latest paintings. I collaged with fabric and then applied paint and dry drawing media. Watch as I show you the process of how I bring life to the surface.

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Preparing for Painting

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Preparing for Painting

In this vlog, I'll walk you through how I start a painting from the very beginning: preparing the canvas and the first layers, and what my focus is at this stage. Stay to the end to see how one painting evolved from beginning through to the final finished form.

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Taking A Painting Backwards

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Taking A Painting Backwards

We all want to finish our paintings, but sometimes we have to take them a few steps backward in order to finish them. This takes courage and big moves, but in my experience always results in a better outcome. In this short Vlog, I demonstrate the process of taking a painting backward to finish it.

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The Beauty of Multiples

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The Beauty of Multiples

Working in multiples is a game-changer in producing work of higher quality, reducing anxiety during the process and maintaining consistency throughout your artwork. Watch as I talk you through my most recent series of paintings and how working on one informs the decisions made in the others.

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Permission To Paint

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Permission To Paint

Do you give yourself permission to paint? When there are pressing demands on your time it’s worthwhile to evaluate the importance of the attention you give to your Art. What it means to you and why you want to spend time playing with paint.

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Selling Your Art

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Selling Your Art

SELLING ART. With the knee-wobbling price of art materials and given that none of us are going to stop producing it’s something that we have to deal with, like it or not. I‘ve learnt that selling Art is a long game. Read my 5 tips for selling your Art.

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Building Layers with Mixed Media

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Building Layers with Mixed Media

How do you integrate drawing and painting techniques in your artwork? Watch how I vary wet and dry media with differences in types of paint application. Working in this way holds my interest in the process and delivers variety to work with going forward.

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Painting with Total Abandon

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Painting with Total Abandon

The journey from difficulty and confusion to clarity and joy. That’s the path we are all on with our Art. We are all at different stages of that path – some at the beginning bogged down among the weeds, and others further along emerging into openness where the path widens and the walking is more easy. We can kind of see the way forward – a bit.

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How To Catch The Viewer's Eye?

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How To Catch The Viewer's Eye?

How do we get the viewer to notice our work? What makes us look twice at something? Knowing how to attract the viewers eye helps us to make more powerful Art.

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Do the Groundwork Women!

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Do the Groundwork Women!

My most recent experience of husbands getting involved with choosing artwork had not ended happily. ‘Dance Steps for Men’ was rejected by a husband (who I assumed couldn’t dance) after his poor wife had come from out of town to see it and almost had the picture hook nailed into her living room wall in anticipation.

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How to Start a Painting

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How to Start a Painting

Some people agonize over starting their paintings, which is a shame really because it’s like setting off on an adventure – but the best sort of adventure. You don’t have to scale heights, get wet, lost or hungry, you don’t even have to leave home. But you ARE venturing into the unknown with very little idea of what will result from the experience.

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Questions to ask...

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New Beginnings...

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New Beginnings...

I also really enjoyed letting loose with drawing and using dry media a lot more in my paintings when I was working on the large sized paintings. This added a playful looseness which I really liked and prevented me working in a straight-line towards finishing when after each painting session I would draw and scribble over the painting. Coming back into it the next day I would cover a lot of the drawing over but the little remnants that peeped through were really fun suggesting a naivety which I liked.

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Is there ‘Precious’ in your Studio?

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Is there ‘Precious’ in your Studio?

Finally, the insistent call of the outside world drags us away and we close the studio door on that tangled grid-locked mess of paint, hope, and self-belief. As we square up to the dishwasher and the dusting that secret smile is now a nagging sense of dread. Am I good enough? Why can’t I figure this out? I’ve killed my precious ….

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Learning to make Art without Fear

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Learning to make Art without Fear

So how do we get the confidence in the beginning when we don’t know that much? We have success. How do we have success when we’re beginning? We need bite-size chunks, roadmaps, guides – frameworks that keep us on track, keep us safe while allowing us to make decisions and learn.

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Sealing & Varnishing

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Sealing & Varnishing

Follow my process as I demonstrate sealing and varnishing an acrylic mixedmedia painting to get a lovely soft satin finish.

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My Why - Why do I paint and Why do I teach?

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My Why - Why do I paint and Why do I teach?

When I was growing up there was no such thing as a ‘why’. Well, we didn’t know we all had one or at least there was no drive to examine our motives and find out. I remember doing quite a lot of motive examination directed by the nuns – but I always fell short and found myself counting down to the next confessional to cleanse my soul.

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To Change or Not To Change Your Painting?

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To Change or Not To Change Your Painting?

What do you do when you have a painting that is ‘ALMOST ‘ right? I had changed my mind about a painting, I liked a lot of it, but there was something not quite right….