Brisbane Art Students Tour

What a day! We met at the Baptist Hinterland Church, so that we could all go together in a 12 person minibus. And what a pleasant drive, the weather was great and traffic much better than expected.

Our first stop was at the Lethbridge Gallery which showed the acrylic work of Scott McDougall.

Next stop GOMA, although quite disappointing, as we hadn’t enough time to see anything significant, we have had a relaxing lunch at the GOMA’s coffee shop, enjoying each others companies and city views on the river.

We then had our last stop at the Art Shed to enjoy a free 2 hour demonstration with Lyn Diefenbach. Lyn shared her knowledge while painting an Australian native scene in oil. It is always amazing to watch professional artists at work, that alone would have been worth going.

Here are just a few points interesting points we have learned today:

• Lyn uses mostly transparent colours, and only sparingly white. She pointed out, what I tell my students over and again. Don’t just use white in areas where an object is hit by light. Most colours turn first into a variety of other colours before one would  add white. Green, so orange and red looks far more realistic if you first use hues of yellow instead of white.
• She uses mostly filbert brushes
• White always has to be used carefully as it steals saturation of colours.
• Lyn pointed out that many areas of a painting have to be greyed down, subdued colours. This not only harmonises the painting but also lifts the brighter colours of the page.
• She mostly works from stained canvases in earthly colours as a base and "inks in", by using thinned down oil to imprint outlines of the image.
• Lyn is using the grid method for complex works.
• Squinting gets rid of colour and exposes the values. As I have told you many times, Lyn also addressed that values are by far more important than the colour itself. That is why even colourblind people can produce great work, even if the colours aren’t realistic.
• Lyn makes sure to sculpt with her brush by painting from many different direction. A picture looks staged and boring if all brush marks run from the same direction.
• We’ve learned that transparent colours in oil leave a shine, whereas opaque paint remains matt.
• She explained that in Australia a Northern Light is more suitable for studio lighting, whereas in America or Europe Southern Light would be better.

If you remember any more interesting facts we have heard or seen, I would love to hear from you, so that I can add it to the list.

We definitely have to do this again.

Martina