Creative Drawing Workshop

Monday 19th February

Cedar Farm Gallery

We were joined by Suzanne Riley for a one off drawing workshop. Suzanne has been a further education teacher in Art and Design for many years, and recently took the leap to focus full time on her own creative business- leading workshops in creative art and textiles. Suzanne's passion is surface design and textiles which comes through in all of her classes, with texture, mixed media and layered techniques being encouraged throughout all of her classes. Sumptuous textures, 3D refief work, stitch and colour play a strong role and we just LOVE her style! If you get the chance to take one of her classes you must!

There were many different techniques covered in the drawing class, but the day kicked off with discussing the variations of graphite pencil and simple mark making activity where participants explore pattern and marks to use within their drawing. Following this we explored drawing in pencil from the sumptuous array of organic still life material on the table which I'm sure we wont look at again in the same way! Mushrooms, pineapple, colourful shells, pine cones, and explored pencil drawing and shading.

Next was the drawing pen, creating simple and precise line drawings and playing with continuous line drawing. Once we'd created these very beautiful but flat images, suzanne then showed us a technique of spraying water over the top of the pen drawing, which seeps into the ink and causes it to blot and spread in the most beautiful way! Another display of Suzanne's for surface and texture.

After that- lunch! and time for some delicious homemade cake for everyone.

The afternoon was spent working on wax resist techniques. Adding colour through dye application or scraping back oil pastels to reveal colour and pattern below. 

This was a truly creative and experimental day covering so many techniques from simple line drawing to applying colour and building layers. Thank you Suzanne for joining us in the Gallery! We'd love to have you back!

The Drawing workshop focuses on visual awareness by learning to look and see. Through using a variety of media you will explore line and tone, and experiment with a range of mark making techniques. Exploring pencil, charcoal, fine liner, water- based paint and wax resist to draw natural and organic forms.

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MODERN CALLIGRAPHY

Creative handwriting at Cedar Farm Gallery

The latest edition to our Gallery Workshop lineup is Modern Calligraphy. Being a big fan of the writing style for a long time, I was very excited to see such a resurgence on Instagram and Pinterest. Calligraphy has appeared everywhere, not just in writing books, but on chalk boards, wedding stationery, even on restaurant walls! 

After searching for local calligraphers, artists and illustrators able to run a class in this modern style I was coming up empty handed, and so was delighted to come across the brilliant workshops of Mellor and Rose. Trained Graphic designers, their workshops are jam packed with lettering and design ideas from Beginners Modern Calligraphy, brush pen lettering and even chalk board writing.
They're a family outfit, like us, and they're based in Lancashire. The perfect team!

We've had 2 workshops in Beginners Modern Calligraphy, with 3 more and a brush lettering class booking up fast. 

If you'd like us to keep you informed of our workshops when they are announced just fill in a a contact form below.

LINO PRINT WORKSHOPS

WITH OLIVIA BROTHERIDGE

THROUGHOUT 2017 

@ CEDAR FARM GALLERY

This year, The Gallery has been thrilled to host a number of workshops by Printmaker, Olivia Brotheridge. A Norfolk based artist, but originally from our small rural community, Olivia was willing to travel the long 5 hour journey to lead various workshops in lino printing and children’s block printing throughout 2017. 

Olivia majored in illustration, and has since become a full time printmaker, leading workshops and demonstrations predominantly in Lino Printing. 

We held 5 very full classes over the course of the year. We absolutely loved having Olivia in the Gallery and can’t wait to welcome her back for more classes in 2018.

If you missed out on classes this year, take a look at some of the incredible work students made using basic lino techniques, as well as the more advanced Reduction Printing.

Reduction printing is a tough one to get your head around at first and involves planning. It is a way of printing with two or more colours using the same piece of lino. By cutting a basic block shape and printing an edition of prints in the first colour, you then work into the same lino block again to cut away the detail you wish to remain, then print on top in a second colour.

We saw some beautiful Reduction prints in our classes, keep an eye out for the  bird and an artichoke…

CERAMICS

PORCELAIN SPOON WORKSHOP
JULY 30TH @ CEDAR FARM GALLERY 

This year we were lucky enough to be joined by Ceramic artist and renound crafts person, Emma Louise Wilson. 

Famous for her delicate and sculptural work in Porcelain, Emma works in fine detail to create and decorate her paper thin vessels.

As avid collectors and followers of Emma’s work, we were thrilled when she agreed to deliver a special workshop at The Gallery as part of our 30th Anniversary celebrations.

MORNING

The day started early as we had a lot to make. Participants each made 3 ceramic pieces from porcelain, a spoon, brooch and wall plaque. 

We began by using a mould to form the shape of the spoon, building the form up in layers carefully as to not leave any weak or thin areas. Once built up in the moulds, these were decorated with decals, lace and stamps to create detail on the spoon. Left to dry in the sun, we began working on our next pieces.

The brooch and wall plaque we built by hand. Simple clay pieces sized and cut out of rolled porcelain clay. We again built up detail with more clay and used lace patterning and stamping to form texture. 

AFTERNOON

By the time we’d had lunch most of our pieces were dry enough to work onto with oxides and glazes. We used two main oxides to bring out the texture and gentle patterns created by the lace and stamping- Indigo blue or deep brown. It was a test to apply the right amount of oxide as the colour only comes out in the firing. (Most of the class were overly cautious in this, which we discovered when our pieces arrived back from the kiln.)

Oxides applied, we moved onto glazes. Less is more in this type of ceramic as the perfect white of the porcelain is feature enough. We very carefully applied small amounts of glaze in the areas we want to highlight, and carefully packed up our little pieces for their short journey back up the M6 to Emma’s kiln in The Lake District.

FIRING

It wasn’t long before our pieces were fired and posted out to the happy recipients. As mentioned earlier, in attempt to not overdo the oxide application some pieces could have had a little more, but the entire day was a learning experience and we certainly took a lot from it, and accomplished so much. 

Looking forward to using these new skills and working with porcelain again soon!

Card Making with Silverwood Emporium

JULY 2017 & DECEMBER 2017
@ THE GALLERY

During the year, we’ve had some excellent events and classes in The Gallery, but the Silverwood Emporium Mixed Media Card Making are high up on my list of favourites.

Rachael Silverwood joined us again after the fun we had at her Textiles Wall hanging class, to show off her skills in card making. Participants made a set of greetings cards; each using a different skill, and each totally uinique.

We looked at decoupage, applique, stamping, collage and embroidery to create a set of individual greetings cards worthy only of gifting to your bestest besty!

During our two classes we saw some amazing creations and we wanted to show you some of our favourites.

We’d love to have more fantastic workshops with Rachael in the New Year so if you’re interested, do let us know and we’ll see what we can muster up! 

Email us.. info@cedarfarmgallery.com or call 01704 822038