blueBanksia art directory lists art short courses and events

I’ve just spent a very pleasant four days learning about Japanese Woodblock Printing at Warringah Printmakers Studio In Manly Vale, NSW with Rosanna Jurisevic.

Warringah Printmakers Studio is a community based, non-profit organisation offering classes, workshops, studio access, regular exhibitions & a variety of exciting & innovative projects for artists with Studio membership.

Grampians workshop an interstate success

by Caroline Tang,
Wimmera Mail Times
26 September 2011

An inaugural Grampians Brushes workshop series was so popular that artists have booked their accommodation for next year.

Founder and co-ordinator Marion Matthews, a Wimmera artist said Grampians Brushes would be at Halls Gap again in 2012. Matthews said the scheduled dates for next year were September 8 – 13.

Sculpture classes with Colin Fenn, a brief synopsis…

• Beginning with creating the sculpture by working directly in microcrystalline wax, (Victory Brown), a relatively soft carving/casting wax, the sculpture or model is created by removing and or adding wax to or from a basic form.
• This creative process can result in a simple ‘Brancusiesque’ style, illustrating clean abstract, sometimes rather geometrical forms or a more complex realistic animal, vegetable or human shape, which may include compound and sometimes intricate undercuts.
• The sculpture is refined in aspects of surface texture and detail and is for all intents and purposes ready to be taken to the foundry to be cast.

Bunginderry Artists Camp held a Photography workshop with Danielle Lancaster during May 2011.

Danielle offered a range of theory and practical tutorials during this four day retreat which was designed to encompass a wide range of photographic skills and to inspire you to take your creative image making to new levels while exploring the unique Channel Country.

Day 1

With frost on the lawn, Day 1 greets us with much anticipation of the day ahead. We have gone back to basics… for some it’s revision and others (like me) it’s completely new and overwhelming. Words like aperture, white balance, fast, slow, freeze and blurr…just to name a few… Danielle Lancaster eases the beginners into the new exciting world of photography and challenges the more experienced to push a little further.

Colin Fenn – renowned sculptor living in the Central West of NSW was guest tutor visiting Merilyn’s classes at her studio and also at Pigments and Palettes in Bathurst.

Colin loves creating interesting creatures and has a cheeky sense of humour.

Have a look at what he has to say about his creatures….all created using the lost wax method.

'My little creatures, (all happy & none of them bad, but full of mischief), are simply objects of sensation and impression. The power of the imagination, mixed with 'modern' and in some cases quite inexpensive materials allow me to 'create' in ceramics, carved stone and metals such as bronze, stainless steel, cast iron and also welded metals (braze welding, Gas metal Arc, Manual metal Arc & TIG)'

by Cindy Goode Milman

Three art friends made our way to the city for a Saturday Wendy Sharpe Master class organised by Simon at S. H. Ervin Gallery,  part of the National Trust of Australia complex, held in conjunction with the survey exhibition of Wendy Sharpe: The Imagined Life (26 February – 10 April).

by Dr Jan Gardner PhD

I took the coast road and drove from Sydney to the beautiful rainforest property in Newee Creek (near Nambucca Heads). The accommodation was spacious and delightful. The food was fabulous. The hosts were friendly, caring and informative. The pottery was delightful.

by Eleanor Brown

Fourteen people showed up to the idyllic park-land setting of the Ku-Ring-Gai Art Centre at Roseville, NSW for a week of life drawing. Paul Miller promised us hard work – and he wasn’t kidding!

Each day was different, we worked through a large range of media with different models and a variety of poses, sitting, standing, moving, lying down. Paul never let the pace slow down for a minute. There was a mixture of elementary exercises and more challenging ones so we could explore new methods of expression and to help each of us develop our own personal approach.