There are so many hidden and treasured locations to explore in Northumberland. It’s a challenge to pick only a few! Layers and layers of history, shape, texture, atmosphere and narrative are abundant, and we will be gathering lots of inspiration in order to create unique interpretations of our own personal response to all that is to be discovered here.

Doorways, arched windows, crumbling walls, ancient textures and text. Silhouettes and shadows. Heraldry and statues. Decadence and decay. The marks left by those long since departed. The colours in the landscape and ancient buildings. We will be gathering personal interpretations of all these things where we will use them to spark even deeper exploration back in the studio.

I will be demonstrating various ways of working with mixed media whilst out in the landscape to gather sketches and studies that are full of texture and atmosphere. Shadowy, inky colour washes, flowing, gestural lines and wonderful mark-making and textural details.

We will then be using these explorations and studies, using mixed media techniques to create one of a kind handmade artist books that tell the story of this place in your own way. These will then inspire some larger mixed media interpretations and compositions that build history and atmosphere, lost and found structures and evocative details layer upon layer.

You will finish the workshop with a sketchbook full of inspiration, a more complete artist book of mixed media explorations, and one or more larger mixed media compositions inspired by your experiences.

There are only a couple of places remaining on this workshop so please contact Kathie Vezzani if you would like to attend! More information on Bellissima Art Escapes – https://www.bellissimaartescapes.com/trips-2020/spaceswithgillianleesmith

This workshop is nearly sold out!

It is this unique landscape of Shetland that will inspire us in the exploration of sculptural artist books.

Using mixed media and paper and card to create forms that lie flat in closed book form but can be shaped to reflect the landscape in ways that reflect the shapes of the landscape and our inspiration.

We will be working from a starting point of a basic book project but experimenting with different ways of taking this so much further into 3-dimensional form.

Creating inspiration in the form of sketches we will be exploring the landscape in mixed media – gestural studies that are a response to the time and place, environment and atmosphere in inks and watercolour.

Using these studies, we will be creating experiments to begin to explore ways of interpreting the landscape in book and page form. Techniques will include monoprint, collage, ink explorations, experimenting with paper textures, text and form. The artist book is a fascinating way of creating objects that fold flat (brilliant for an away from home workshop) but that can be made three dimensional for display.

I will have examples of the possibilities, and will share the process, and students will be encouraged to take this development further and make their own discoveries along the way.

We will finish the week with a sketchbook and pages of studies and sketches and practice book samples as well as completed several unique artist books.

There are only a very few places remaining on this workshop – if you would like to join us then please go to Bellissima Art Escapes for more information, itinerary and to register: https://www.bellissimaartescapes.com/trips-2020/shetlandgillianleesmith

This workshop is nearly sold out. Register now to secure your space!