COURSES AT A GLANCE | sebastianaplin

Courses at a glance

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Gift vouchers are available on request

Booking required for all courses

Click on the arrow to open a list of materials needed.

Long Pose Life Model Sessions

Saturday afternoons once a month.

£20 for the 4 hour session.

Times published on Facebook or by e mail using the website contact form.

Group size is limited to 8 and so advance booking and £10 deposit is required (e mail me so that I can supply you with BACS information). This session is designed for people to complete a more finished drawn or painted piece. Boards and easels are available and drawing paper can be bought at cost price.

Come early to set up and have a tea/coffee.

Life drawing

Thursdays 5:30 to 7:30 (September to June)

£10 a session

Artists have been drawing the human form for centuries and it continues to be the most popular drawing challenge available to both amateur and professional. Through this activity you will build up a repertoire of skills that you can transfer into your artistic practice.

The evening actually starts at 5:10 when you can come and have a cup of tea or coffee and look at some slides of great drawings that will inspire and give us ideas on how to tackle the evening’s drawing session. Life model drawing will then begin at 5:30 prompt. Tutoring is entirely optional and any level of experience is always welcome.

You can pay for individual sessions on the door or buy a £40 voucher for 5 life drawing sessions.

There is a suggestions book that you can fill in if you would like me to consider specific poses, artists or music that will enrich our drawing experience.

Feel free to stay for a coffee at the end to show your work and get some feedback and encouragement from others in the group. Follow Aplin Studios on Facebook for up to date information about the life model sessions.

Painting in acrylics.

Tuesdays 5:30 to 8

5 sessions £70

This is where we grapple with colour and discover the mysterious behaviour of colours when they interact. The course is based around selected studies from life that will make the result of our colour choices explicit so that they can be analysed subsequently. This is a great course if you are familiar with drawing but would like to become more confident with the use of paint.

Principle areas covered: colour theory and harmony, cool and warm colours, colour mixing.

The principles of drawing

Wednesdays 5:30 to 7:30

8 week course, £95

This course deals with the key concepts that underpin traditional drawing and painting that will help you to draw accurately from life or from photographs. I have chosen to make this a longer course due to the importance of drawing as a foundation skill for traditional art practice. We will discover the blocks that prevent us “drawing what we see” and look at how great draftsmen have created amazing drawings through the centuries.

Charcoal and pastels provide a bridge between drawing and painting since they combine the ability to draw line and block in form. Some degree of “layering” can also add to the richness of the work in these media. We will concentrate on the understanding and use of lights and darks to add solidity and depth to our work and begin to explore the ways in which forms are suggested rather than explained through a mastery of value.

Principle areas covered: observational skills, outlines, positive and negative forms, contrast, sculpting forms with light, composition,value range (dark to light), contrast, volume, depth and distance, simplification/modelling of form.

Watercolour sketching

Wednesdays 5:30 to 8

5 sessions £70

There is nothing like a bit of "plein air" landscape sketching to sharpen one's painterly vision. This is a great medium to consolidate the practice of choosing tone carefully to suggest form. As we rely on the light of the paper through layers of pigment we are able to develop a different approach to building colours and giving the illusion of depth.

Principle areas covered: Dry/wet techniques, mixed media, masking techniques, shifting the value register, sketching essentials.

Portraiture in Oils

Time and date to be announced

For those looking for the ultimate challenge in painting. In this course we will develop more complex ideas around tone and colour which form the basis of effective painting. We’ll explore the unique qualities of oil paint and see how they may suit different painting methods.

Principle areas covered: Grounds and supports, solvents and mediums, wet in wet painting, glazing, using a palette knife, strategies to develop finished pieces, mood and narrative.