Previous Abstract Group Meetings

Have a look at what we have been doing at the different events and some of the work produced by members during the day!

Friday 15th September - Inspired by Contemporary Abstract Artists

For the homework for this session, the group was given photos and links to 7 contemporary abstracts artists, with an idea to choose one that either just appealed, or one that had a very different approach that would provide a challenge, or one that was 'interesting'. The members were challenged to find out more about that artist, their work and their approach to making art, and consider their findings with some of the things we have learnt as a group over the last 6 months or so (colour palette, composition and so on). The aim was not to particularly copy the artist, or even to paint in their style, but to learn from them and then reflect where each of us wanted to take out our work further.

And it did not disappoint! Across the group today there were lots of different, fresh ideas emerging from that reflection, which inspired paintings we started today!

Robert Ingham

Jo Sykes

Karen Dewhirst

Fiona Colston

Friday 18th August - Making Collage Papers ( and other things!)

In today’s meeting most of the group had a go using gel plates to create patterned and textured papers that will be used in a future collage activity supporting composition.
Members are developing collections of papers that are full of variety of colour, scale, marks and patterns etc. These include personally painted ones, found papers, magazines and texts.
A couple of members were continuing with their own paintings.

Here are some of the papers produced today

Friday 21st July - Exploring Composition.

Louise led this month's meeting looking at different types of compositional format. For homework members had chosen various formats to explore and it was interesting to see what each had produced as they took a playful approach to practising the different types such as ‘unbalanced’, ‘T shape’, ‘grid’ or ‘explosion’. The main session today was spent working further into pieces and several of us used our concertina sketchbooks to carry on exploring formats.

Some of the homework is shown below.

Jo Sykes

David Whiting

Stacey Shaw

Robert Ingham

Kathy Atkinson

Friday 23rd June - Continuing Exploring Mixing Colours with an Emphasis on Cool and Warm Colours

For the homework for this session, we challenged ourselves to use only two colours and black and white. Alternatively, members could just use a monochrome palette or even one colour. See below for some of our experiments!

Annabel Maamoun

Robert Ingham

Kath Atkinson

David Whiting

Jo Sykes

Rachael Singleton

Louise Heptonstall

The main section of the session today was spent painting two identical compositions in a warm palette and cool palette and comparing the two. Sometimes a pop of colour from the other palette was added for contrast.

Rachael Singleton

Annabel Maamoun

Jo Sykes

Kath Atkinson

Louise Heptonstall

Friday 19th May - Painting with a Limited Palette and Learning about Colour Mixing

In this session we explored a limited palette, for example choosing a red, blue and yellow, black and white, or a warm and cold or each colour and black and white. Some members looked into other ways to limit a palette such as the Zorn palette, or use a substitute for blue and black such as Payne’s Grey. We also discussed methods of colour mixing and ways of harmonising our chosen colour palette and using pops of complementary colours for emphasis as we worked on developing paintings started in 'homework' or experimented with further colour combinations.

Rachael Singleton

Louise Heptonstall

Jo Sykes

Annabel Maamoun

Rachel Sykes

Stacey Shaw

Nina Bensley

Linda Riggall

Jane Hayes

Friday 28th April - Painting a Visual Response to Music

This session was about creating a visual response to a shared piece of music. We listened to a couple of very different pieces whilst working. In preparation for this session, members were invited to have a go at painting a visual interpretation to music of their own choice.

The two slideshows of photos below are from the group session, with the 'homework' photos in the block below that.

For the group session the first piece of music is called ‘Celestial Flight’ by Bill Connors. This is a slow, more peaceful piece.

The next piece was completely different and much more upbeat, called ‘Pizzicato Party’ again by Bill Connors

Louise Heptonstall

David Whiting

Jo Sykes

Rachael Singleton

Shirley Waddington

Harry Lynn

Friday 10th March - Abstract Painting from Still Life

The physical session was cancelled due to snow but members participated virtually, using the same photo of the still life (below) producing the following work.

Members were invited to use the photo to explore the shapes and lines to create abstract interpretations of the still life. This exercise included thinking about colour palette, composition, and orientation of objects or marks, to be inspired by the image, but maybe move away from a purely representational response.

Jo Sykes

Rachael Singleton

Stacey Shaw

David Whiting

Louise Heptonstall

Karen Whitwam

Rachel Sykes

Linda Riggall

Robert Ingham

Shirley Waddington

Carol Wood

Friday 17th February - In the style of Mondrian

In today's session we were invited to paint from an image working either in simplified geometric shapes, different colours or simplifying shapes in the images.

The homework preparation for this session was to look at the art of Mondrian, who often worked in geometric patterns using primary colours, or to consider the work of other artists working in simple geometric shapes such as Klee. the photos below are some of the paintings members of the group produced resulting from this research.

Friday 13th January - Using concertina sketchbooks as 'playgrounds' for exploration.

Members were invited to use previous work on large paper to turn it into a concertina sketchbook. These were worked into further in today's session, focussing particularly on the concept of ‘differences’ - using a variety of shape, line, value and paint application using tools.