Surrey Artists’ Open Studios 2015

Last year’s Open Studios were a great way to meet artists and visit local studios. This year I visited fewer studios and spent more time with the artists. With more painting experience it was easier to have meaningful conversations and obtain additional art advice.

Karen Pearson creates beautiful artwork covering mixed media, watercolour, acrylic painting and sculpture. She is interested in helping other artists hone their craft and in the short time speaking with her I knew she was a kindred spirit. Can't wait to to attend her next set of classes in Dorking.

Eric Barfield has an intimate studio where he paints, sculpts, draws and runs art classes. I took an excellent taster class with Eric and learned about drawing hands and feet. There was also a bonus section on drawing a live belly dancer. It was a fantastic tutorial and I can’t wait to take his life drawing art course.

Paul Simmons is a great guy with absolutely beautiful artwork; he will be speaking at my local art group meeting in November. Paul loves to paint and gave me expert advice chock full of wonderful tips and tricks of the trade. I fell in love with a particular watercolour painting by Paul of Manhattan.

Ochre Print Studio is an open access print studio in Guildford for artists of all abilities. The studio exhibited a large variety of artwork from their students and with a large facility they have many different printmaking courses, which look fun and interesting.

Treacle Gallery Group is where I caught up with the wonderful Lillian Spibey, who was my photography instructor last year. There were three other artist displaying their artwork. Julie Barham with ceramics, Louisa Sullivan with glassworks and Becca Clegg with acrylic paintings. Julie wasn’t there, but Louisa had a wonderful display of glass objects and was very easy to talk with. Becca was enthusiastic about her artwork and happy to discuss her beautiful landscape paintings of colourful skies, fields and flowers.

Aquarius in Godalming was the last stop on my tour of studios. I met two very nice ladies Nola Armstrong and Elizabeth Calthorpe. Each has a different artistic style and both artists produce beautiful works of art. Nola uses mixed media to create magnificent floral arrangements and sells cards along with lovely framed abstract artwork. Elizabeth is a versatile artist who uses different mediums to compose breath-taking imagery of animals, landscapes and beach scenes.  The three of us chatted for a while; talking about different mediums, techniques, art groups and photography…it was a great way to end the three eye opening weekends.