Week Four: Horses! Landscapes! Portraits!

Most of the group completed their portraits and were ready to move on to our horses project. Whilst some continued with landscapes. Excellent response to the portrait in a landscape concept - quite a challenge!

Anne: good to see such a bold approach to the shapes, lines and tones. Focus on the dark tones next and really get darkness into them. This will help you see the lighter tones more clearly.

Anne: excellent painting. Lovely application of solid colour. Strong placement of the face. If you wanted to do any more on this then focus on the portrait and increase the darkness of the hair and beard to make him a bit more solid.

David: great to see such a bold and abstract use of background landscape, making the palette your own. I would blend in a second colour to the blue/turquoise and also a second colour into the pink sand to make them feel as solid as the sky colours. Then add more darkness to the hair and beard to add a sense of depth on his face. 

Janice: very good start. The dark background colours are key and you have done these really well. Keep your marks loose and instinctive on the horse - as you have done today. 

John: great painting. The finishing touches you did today on the face and the background work well. If you want to do any more I would look at the sea on the right behind his shoulder and make it more consistent (colours, lights and darks) as the large area of sea on the left of the portrait. 

Karen: good to see you focusing on a large work giving you the room to really dig deep into the colours and technique.   Concentrate on the tonal values from dark to light and look carefully at the transition areas where dark turns to light. Also look carefully at the way shapes "turn".

Margaret: excellent choice of subject. Strong start with good tone and texture. Focus next on getting the soft dark sky in and the dark hills. Only add the lighter tones after the dark ones are in place.

Moira: such a large drawing - this will allow you to enjoy painting the colours with freedom and space. Do not over-draw the horse - it's about right now. Keep observing carefully as you apply the ground colours so you can correct and features that you feel are not quite right in the drawing.

Val: lovely study of a horse. You have achieved a good sense of light with your sensitive use of tonal values. I also really like that you are not afraid to highlight the almost 'geometric' shapes in the horse. Perhaps you need one more darker tone in small areas to make the head more solid / 3D. Then gridding this up and enlarging it to be an A3 painting would be a good next step.