.... no more teacher's dirty looks.....

Pictured (clockwise from bottom right); yours truly, Carmel, Marillyn, Chris P., Harvey, Richard, John, Maureen, Don, (AWOL Chris B.)(Just kidding about the AWOL)

This group helped me pass my Fridays at warp speed over the last seven weeks - it's been a pleasure - thankyou one and all.

(For anyone interested, the next course is a Sunday course starting Jan17 at 10am to 1pm and going on for the following six weeks after that. IT'S FULL.)

Despite what I said about taking a break I look like doing another Friday course starting around 23 April 2010 so if you're interested drop me a line. Just click here.

I wish you all a very merry Christmas and a safe, happy and healthy new year.

John from life - Fri 6th November 2009

This set of sequential pics was started at the class on Friday and completed at home yesterday.
As usual I have begun with a very thin sketching in (this time without charcoal at the beginning).
This was followed by searching out the darks and gradually working towards the lights.
John's white hair catches a lot of the reflected light in the classroom and in order to bring it out more strongly I chose to paint in a very dark contrasting background. In keeping with the appearance of an oil sketch I deliberately left the clothing unfinished and used only bold strokes - it contrasts nicely with the level of detail in the head.

Size approx 40cm x 50cm - time taken approx 3 hrs

Blue Rinse

Blue Rinse - oil on canvas - 30cm x 40cm

The blue rinse was very popular among elderly ladies a few years ago - it sort of said " I may be getting old but I've still got style, baby." We see it a lot less these days but for me it still speaks of kindly, grandmotherly types who accept aging as a part of life.

John Burns

John Burns - oil on canvas - 40cm x 30cm

John was a member of my last portrait class at Port Adelaide and I thank him for agreeing to sit for the current class.
This little work was started during the first lesson as a demo and completed today after another hour of work.

The current class is well under way and a further class is planned for seven weeks from mid January to end of February 2010. (Places are limited and I have six names already.)
This will be a Sunday morning class for those who find difficulty in attending during the week. After this class I will be taking some time to attend to other matters, so if you wish to do a course next year it may be wise to get in early. You can contact me through the link on my website at right.

St Peters Cathedral Demonstration

Harold Anderson - oil on canvas - 30cm x 36cm

Harold is the Mayor of Charles Sturt Council
I took a quick photo from the TV last night and printed it out
on A4 bond paper just before coming into Adelaide
to do the demonstration.

Mike Barr, Alan Ramachandran and I enjoyed an afternoon
of relaxed painting and chatting.
As you can see from the pictures below,
the Cathedral is a wonderful space in which to hold
and art exhibition and to give a painting demonstration.

The dignity and solemnity of the venue may have suffered
under our "performance"
but it lost none of its delightful ambience.
A big thankyou to Rosie and John Hamilton for organising things
and to everyone who helped and who came along to watch.

As usual click on the pic to enlarge.

Elizabeth H. Blackburn - Nobel Laureate

Elizabeth H. Blackburn - Nobel Laureate -30cm x 40cm - oil on canvas

Quoting from the Nobel prize website

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2009 is jointly awarded to

Elizabeth H. Blackburn, Carol W. Greider and Jack W. Szostak

for the discovery of

"how chromosomes are protected by telomeres and the enzyme telomerase"

How wonderful that an Australian scientist has again shared in the Nobel prize for medicine.
I can only add my congratulations to those of countless others and hope that my little portrait
sketch honours her achievement.

Dr. Mike Bossley

Dr. Mike Bossley - 36" x 48" - oil on streched canvas

For the last few months I've been involved with the Faces of the Port project which paired ten artists with ten subjects to produce a set of portraits for display during the 2009 Port Adelaide Festival. My subject was noted dolphin researcher, Dr. Mike Bossley, and the result of our collaboration is this portrait.
The project was co-ordinated by the Port Adelaide Council and the exhibition of finished works will be on display during the festival at the Port Dock Railway Museum from Saturday 10 October.
I enjoyed the project and was delighted to meet Mike. In a world that's so preoccupied with profit and self agrandisment it is always a pleasure to find individuals who are motivated by higher ideals.

Here's a link to a little video of me talking about Mike and the painting.

Harry Finished

Harry Leach - 60cm x 75cm - oil on stretched canvas

This is the final result of the work started a few weeks ago as part of the first set of Portait Classes at Port Adelaide. The image isn't the clearest but I'll swap it out when I get a better one.
The work will be (hopefully) available to view during the Spring exhibition of members' work
at the Royal South Australian Society of Arts from Sun 11 Oct.

Incidentally this Saturday at 2pm 10 Oct I will be joining friends Mike Barr,
Alan Ramachandran and John Hamilton in a quadratic display of artists demonstrating
their peculiar approaches to art at the Adelaide Cathedral Art Show
in St Peters Cathedral in North Adelaide.
The session is free to view and everyone is welcome. Seating in the pews.

Young Footballer

Young Footballer - 28cm x 16cm approx - watercolour on 140lb medium paper

Just for a change I thought I'd post a watercolour.
This one was done a little while ago and the subject is
a young Aussie Rules player from a local team.
After the discipline and application that oils require
I enjoy the looseness and freedom that watercolours
can provide and I especially like the fact
that I can do a lot of them quite quickly.

Let me know if you want to see more watercolours - or if you'd prefer to see oils.

Young lady

Young Lady - 40cm x 30cm - oil on canvas

I'm sure that sometimes it does us all a lot of good todo something that
is outside of our usual comfort zone.
This is not the usual sort of portrait for me - lots of soft edges
and gentle transitions from light to shade.
Still I enjoyed the challenge and you can be the judge as to how it turned out.

End of days

The last day of the course –

standing left to right -Marilou, Marillyn, Mignon, Heather, Colleen, Jan, John B, Glenda

seated – yours truly, Meg, Harry and John D.

with just a sample of their works –

Well done guys, it was a real pleasure. Please stay in touch.

ArtsNorth Workshop

The picture at the top was produced at this morning's workshop at ArtsNorth. As you can see from the other photos we had a nice turnout and an even nicer "nosh up" afterwards. I'm a fraid I made the subject a somewhat challenging one (forgive me) but I was thrilled with the effort everyone put in. Give yourselves all a pat on the back!
It may not have seemed like it at all times but it was fun - thanks everyone.

Loreto "Star Portraits"

Megan LLoyd - oil on canvas -75cm x 75cm

This portrait was produced as part of the, now, annual Loreto School "Star Portraits" scheme conducted in association with their annual Art Sale. The subject was Megan LLoyd, current editor of Adelaide's weekend paper "The Sunday Mail" and former editor of Messenger Newspapers. Megan was a gracious subject during our only photo/sketch sitting. I enjoyed the process and felt that my rendering was both sensitive and realistic.
Thank you Loreto organisers for the opportunity to participate.

St.Peters Cathedral Art Show

Smoking Ceremony - Major Sumner - oil on canvas - approx 600mm x 1400mm - $5000

Last year I was fortunate enough to win the coveted "Best in Show" award at the annual St. Peters Cathedral Art Show with my painting "Love on the Rails". This year's entry is of Major Sumner, a Ngarrindjeri elder, performing a Smoking Ceremony to summon the ancestors of the tribe. The ceremony is a ritual cleansing and I was moved to paint him after witnessing this religious ceremony earlier this year.

Harry developed

Well as you can see quite a lot has changed in the portrait since the last stage. I decided to really push the contrast and to try to gain the maximum impact from the portrait. I revisited a lot of the edges and tones/shapes and colours as well as making some tentative strokes in the jacket area. I'll try to work on that and some other elements in the next few days with a view to finishing the painting by the time the current class sessions finish on the 25th September.