mixed media art course creating abstract seascapes overlooking porthmeor beach

Unfolding Sea + Sky

Mixed Media / Landscape - Materials included

We haven’t scheduled this course yet. Please email us to register your interest for future availability.

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Course details

Make your own concertina sketchbook, panoramic sea and sky unfolding freely across the pages. Make gestural work in a range of media, capturing the movement of light, air and water.

This two-day course makes the abstract approachable, working from the vast expanses of sea and sky that sit just outside our studios. Create and bind your own concertina sketchbook to work into, allowing the shifting shadows and shapes to unfold freely across the pages. Use experimental materials such as salt, spray, ink and wax to evoke air, light and water.

Working out in the St Ives landscape attunes you to the moments that go unnoticed – a flicker of light or a halt in the breeze, that bring the landscape to life. Inspirational artist Jill Eisele leads you through structured drawing tasks to record and collect these to bring back to the studio with you.

There, you’ll use inks, resists and waterbased media to develop your drawings. These become the covers for your concertina sketchbook, a cocoon for your work to emerge from. The expansive pages of the book are an ideal place for happy accidents to occur, as experiments with different media and techniques reveal the unpredictable, much like the sea and sky themselves.

Learn from the likes of Turner and Constable how to make broader, more gestural strokes that still feel authentic to you. See how bringing movement into your painting style translates to more suggestive painting, capturing transiency and fluidity.

Your sketchbook is an invaluable tool, both during and after the course, allowing you to think pragmatically as an artist by framing, fragmenting and cropping compositional elements to inspire larger paintings. This course is a unique opportunity to develop a looser, more experimental way of expressing seascapes.

Day to day plan

This is a rough indication of what to expect over the course. However sometimes the structure of the days may alter depending on the nature of the group and weather.

Day 1

Outside in the St Ives coastal environment, tutor Jill Eisele guides you through drawing tasks en plein air. Back in the studio, use inks, resists and watersoluble paints in free and expressive ways, referring to your earlier drawings and focusing on the movement and colours of sea and sky. Use select pieces to make a concertina sketchbook to experiment in throughout the course.

Day 2

Looking at Turner and Constable as artistic reference points, begin making broader, more gestural marks. Consider aerial perspective, translucency and transparency before going to the beach to experiment further with materials freely across the pages of your concertina sketchbook, developing its structure and texture

 

What will I learn?

  • 1. Learn to make your own concertina sketchbook
  • 2. Experiment with unusual combinations of materials
  • 3. Explore gestural, expressive mark-making
  • 4. Learn about aerial perspective and how to portray light, movement and fluidity
  • 5. Learn techniques for noticing and recording details when you’re out sketching.

Who would this course suit?

The course would suit anyone that would like to develop a confident and free approach to seascapes. It is an opportunity to experiment with a range of alternative media as well as develop more technical confidence in gestural mark-making and expressive approaches to light, air and water.

Unfolding Sea and Sky

Mixed Media / Landscape – Materials included

We haven’t scheduled this course yet. Please email us to register your interest for future availability.

Register Interest

Taught by

Jill
Eisele

View Jill’s Work

My practice begins with drawing, often taking me to wild and wonderful parts of Cornwall, capturing fleeting moments where light and colour create atmosphere and expression. These underpin my largely figurative paintings, which convey a sense of incompleteness; of place and mystery.

What to Bring

Our studios are fully equipped and we provide you with all the materials you need for your course. However, if you have a favourite set of brushes or any specialist materials that you would prefer to use, please bring them with you.

Timings and Breaks

The first day starts at 10am and finishes at 4.30pm, please aim to arrive ten to fifteen minutes before the start time.

All course days after that start at 9.30am and finish at 4pm and there will be an hour for lunch. There are plenty of nearby places to eat and we will serve tea and coffee at break times during the day.

FAQs

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