The Chris Forsey workshop ‘River on the Moors’ took place on Saturday 30th July at Uplowman Village Hall. The inspiration for the painting came from a recent visit Chris had made to Exmoor and the subject was the River Barle in early Spring.

Chris demonstrated his technique by initially preparing an acrylic sheet of paper, laying out his colour paint choices and then setting to work making quick, confident brush strokes with large flat brushes and later refining with a palette knife.

He continued to work up to a mid point with his painting and then we returned to our tables to do the same. We watched again later as he completed his painting adding acrylic ink.

We all got together for lunch and a chat outside, and then it was more painting before a final appraisal by Chris at the end of the afternoon.

The workshop was quite challenging and stretched most of us but we were not daunted by the task!  I do feel that workshops are so useful for taking us out of our ‘comfort zone’ to learn new techniques and perhaps try out mediums we have not used before.

Chris was very pleased with our work and gave each of us some constructive comments.

It was a pleasure to see such an accomplished artist in action and to be painting in the company of other TAS members.

By Elaine Chetham