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- Ashley Hanson
'Do you have a special tree? A 2 day ZOOM workshop painting your tree: real or imagined, magical, spiritual, symbolic, totemic, in bloom or bare and linear. In terms of painting, the motif of the tree presents opportunities to explore narrative and structure, strength and delicacy, expressive mark-making and abstraction'
The selection of paintings above above shows the exceptional response to the motif of 'TREE' in our latest online 'Freedom in Painting' workshop. The artists were asked to bring along studies and ideas to the workshop which began with a comprehensive slideshow of trees in art history from Durer to Auerbach. For me, the highlight of the research was the full-blown visceral expressionism of Joan Mitchell and Chaim Soutine.
The talk was followed by a demonstration and group exercise, where I showed how to make further linear studies from the studies, exploring possibilities of composition, strength, delicacy and mark-making with a single brush. Surrounded by studies we made our choices of design and colour for the morning painting session. Luckily, Denise was on hand to take photos during the day, as my own 'Tree' painting developed.
The afternoon was taken up with individual tutorials, with each artist emailing me an image off their painting before we discussed their ideas and paintings. There were also further demonstrations mid-afternoon and first thing on Friday before the morning tutorials. Things were happening, studies transforming into paintings, those first thoughts and marks leading to others...
On Friday, some of the artists took up the option to start a second painting. After lunch, we had the final painting session, silent working time as the artists pushed their paintings further. We finished the workshop with a Group Critique, after I put together a Powerpoint of the latest versions of the paintings. It was a revelation, how far the paintings had come in 2 days concentrated working. A real treat for us all, and instructive too, to see the work of the artists and to give and receive comment. Below, you can see the how a couple of the paintings developed in the workshop and afterwards.
Hats off to all the artists!
'I want to reach the state of condensation of sensations which constitutes a picture. Perhaps I might be satisfied momentarily with a work finished at one sitting, but I would soon get bored looking at it; therefore, I prefer to continue working on it so that later I may recognize it as a work of my mind' MATISSE
Carol Hayslip
Artist Testimonials
I think your method of running the workshops must be unique. You put so much effort and time into the preparation and give so much attention and interaction with participants individually. We learn so much from sharing your decision making, courage to experiment and change things, choices of colour palette, composition etc with your own painting. You have an amazing way of teaching which is by inspiration rather than prescription. Beryl Hawker
Ashley has become expert in presenting a two-day online painting workshop, with a packed timetable including tutorials, demonstrations, plenty of painting time, information, inspiration and group comment. And a friendly atmosphere! Jan Bunyan
I really loved the workshop. Ashley is a brilliant teacher and always encouraging. I thought the slide show was particularly good and really well researched. I have started a series on trees as he recommended. Barry Kellington
I always enjoy Ashley’s intro and slide show from the historical up to sometimes unexpected contemporary art. Ashley doesn’t dictate, he suggests the possibilities in your painting keeping you positive. You may not always agree but to have someone really look at your work and discuss what is working or not is a privilege. Carol Hayslip
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- Ashley Hanson
'Polruan Tree Blue' 70x50cms
TUES 6 DEC 2022
'A celebration in blue' - thank-you, Jane Crane. A final few tweaks of line and colour, a final soaring, framing blue introduced, the wonderful Michael Harding 'Kings Blue Deep' into the top-right corner.
A remembered tree, with the diamond-shaped Fowey estuary wedged into the 'v' of the twin-forks of a tree. Except memory plays tricks: a return to Polruan and no such view exists, the tree is not where I remembered it. This is the artist putting together a painting in his head, finding visual connections, fusing the two elements together. Painting-truth. The blue palette was chosen as a reaction to the oranges and yellows I've been working with predominantly this year. Thank-you Denise!
detail
A third element was the long shed-like Polruan Village Hall - which we have used as a studio on our 'Freedom in Painting' courses - jammed into the studies below. Above or below or behind the tree? The simpler solution I found was to have an ambiguous broken red/orange line, that references both the roofline and estuary. The breakthrough in the painting came with the mirrored upward movement of blues and branches and the procession of blue and green mixes through the centre, diamond within diamond...
evolution...
The painting emerged from the studies below, exploring possibilities of design and orientation and weight of line, then developed on our recent online 'TREE' painting-workshop,
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- Ashley Hanson
We recently welcomed two groups of artists to our Autumn 'Freedom in Painting' courses in Porthleven, held in the Old Lifeboat House, in Porthleven, Cornwall, in its magnificent location at the head of the harbour. The artists, with different levels of experience, came from all over the UK, looking for inspiration and with the ambition of pushing their practice further. As always, Porthleven delivered...
View from the studio
We began, as always, with a Saturday morning gallery visit, this time visiting Tate St. Ives and exhibitions by contrasting contemporary landscape painters, Paul Wadsworth and Neil Canning. Back to the studio for our first group painting exercise, where the artists were asked to explore the motif of 'stripes', which have been increasingly prevalent in my own work recently. The artists were asked to reference colours from both the landscape and the paintings from the morning in St Ives, with the discipline of giving all the stripes their own character and difference. Below is a selection of the resulting studies from the exercise, showing some remarkable ingenuity.
'Stripes'
On the Sunday morning drawing session, we continued the theme of stripes, with the artists drawing stripes on the pages of their sketchbooks - horizontal/vertical/diagonal - before entering the landscape. The idea was to adapt the stripes on the page to the landscape, to find connections, to make a different kind of drawing which could lead to a different kind of painting.
In the afternoon demonstration, I started my own painting of Porthleven, starting with stripes of differing colours and textures, applied with differing techniques, before introducing one of my drawings of the gap between two of the piers, which had caught my eye that morning. The artists followed the demonstration in their own paintings, choosing a favourite drawing to work from.
in the studio
At the end of the day on Monday, we had a group critique with all the artists ready to show their paintings after 3 long sessions. Most artists started a second or even third or fourth painting over the next couple of days, each painting feeding the next. There was continuous one to one tuition and further demonstrations as I worked on 'Porthleven 61'. We cleared the studio around 2 on Wednesday to prepare for the Thursday exhibition, with all the artists contributing amicably to the hang. Always a thrilling moment when the paintings are revealed.
In the studio early: Dawn at dawn!
Our exhibition is a point of difference to other painting courses in Cornwall and this year we had 200 visitors over the two exhibitions, giving the artists getting a chance to speak with visitors about their work and to have a good look at what the other artists achieved on the course. All part of the learning process.
Carmen Renwick paintings
The October Course followed the same format with the exploration of the theme of stripes. As you can see below, the September group hung on closely to the theme, whereas with the October artists, the theme is generally more elusive, providing a structure for the paintings. Congratulations to all fourteen artists: your hard work and ambition has resulted in a fantastic group of paintings. We hope to see you again soon and also see some of the paintings in our exhibition in Henley next October 'Cornwall, Colour & Coast'.
GALLERY: SEPTEMBER COURSE
GALLERY: OCTOBER COURSE
ARTISTS COMMENTS ABOUT THE COURSE:
'What a wonderful location to be in. I feel energised and ready to pursue my painting with vigour again. Your one-to-one sessions are so helpful, your insights are brilliant, Ashley. Thank-you.' CARMEN RENWICK
'The course was really helpful - colour, tone, methods of mixing and choosing colour, line and definition. Ashley - you are a super teacher and so willing to offer suggestions as to the way forward' CHRISTINA HARRISON
'I needed this weeks course to get my art going again, thank-you. Really enjoyed myself, very inspirational and Ashley is an amazing tutor' LESLEY TURNER
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- Ashley Hanson
4.
MON 22 AUG 2022
This morning, I worked more yellows into the top oranges - 'sky' - to find another, softer, stripe. Above is the best solution: straight but curved, a quiet presence, an echo of the brushstroke on the bottom edge and the thin line above. It went back into the studio three times: It is pure instinct - pure painting - why each of the three versions below were rejected. . (3) was close, the top-stripe strong, pressing downwards, but too attention grabbing and competing with the force of the charging blue brush-mark. My best brushmark ever? Pure knowing. The final version (above) just 'is': sublime colour and twisting, ambiguous space and form., Porthleven as I've never seen it or painted it.
My only doubt - the title! 'Porthleven 48' was also called 'Orange Pier' - still time to change before I write on the back?
This orange/green thing is getting out of hand!
detail
The big moves were made yesterday, finding Porthleven in the paint. The breakthrough was the loaded cerulean brush mark smashing into the chevron - like a meteor - the same mark reversed on the bottom-edge, dragged through the orange. There is an exciting motion in this piece, contained - barely - by the strength of the green-line, now open on the right edge. The isolated orange brushmark, originally one of five, is very powerful, now the only vertical. Visually, it seems in the right place. I wish I'd recorded the early stages of the painting: random marks, including black, with a possibility of 'harbour'...
(3)
(2).
(1.)
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- Ashley Hanson
Selected for the Winter Group Show at Linden Hall Studio, 1 Dec 2023 - 30 Jan 2024
UPDATE: 11 DEC 2023
This has been on the wall in our kitchen ever since it was made. I knew the orange shape on the right but couldn't place it, not stopping the enjoyment of the painting. Finally this summer I remembered the shape of Maine, which I'd painted 5 times in my 'AMERICASCAPES' series and changed the title, which I felt gave it an extra layer of meaning and memory. Perhaps I am not an abstract painter after all!
SAT 20 AUG
A return to the excitement of colour and materials and taking risks....freedom in painting...
Taking ownership of those 'Scully' stripes (my demonstration painting in the recent workshop, below) and bringing vitality and movement to the canvas. The central transparent red-earth stripe broke the pattern, the angled liquid orange broke the division and the stasis, introducing the dynamic, reinforced by new greens and an uplifting blue stripe in the corner. Looks good this way too;
Balance...
Staring for an hour at the study below...self-doubt, juggling possibilities, painting in my head. This could have been a seascape, harbour; this could have been beach huts, this could have been Porthleven...but I chose colour to unify the painting, first the greens, then the orange, over a drawn triangle, guiding the direction of the pour...