"Snowbound" – painting online with Randy Hale
While this fun landscape captures the chill of winter, it really is an exercise in designing NEGATIVE SHAPES. These become most dramatic when dark values push up against them to create obvious CONTRASTS.
Randy says: “I designed the overlapping buildings so their rooftops link together becoming a visual bridge of negative shapes to lead our eye thru the composition.
“Backgrounds above and behind the rooftops are laid in as a soft wet-in-wet, and are cool to suggest distance. Painted wet, these backgrounds include some warms along with cools to suggest distant trees or forest, but the overall temperature remains cool. Keepng these backgrounds dark in value will make the snowy rooftop “shapes” pop forward quite dramatically. The rooftops are angular while the pathway into the painting is organic and soft – but as negative shapes, they become important elements the viewer will focus upon.
“Oblique vertical shapes (both negative and positive), contain the viewer within the composition and provide a rhythmic intersect across the horizontal rooftops.”
“Falling snow is the finishing flourish applied as a delicate splatter of white gouache to reinforce the quietude of your SNOWBOUND painting.”
Unlike many online painting tutors, Randy will not expect you to ‘look over his shoulder’ for a long demonstration, and perhaps be allowed to ask the odd question or two. No, you will be painting along at more or less the same time, trying out the watercolour techniques that Randy shows you, step-by-step. He will demonstrate some basic techniques for only a few minutes before you start painting the same subject at home. Then, after you’ve been given a little time to catch up, Randy will move onto the next part of the process. Lois Breckon from The Watermill at Posara will be on hand during the session to feed your questions. The session will last a couple of hours.
When you register for the session you will be asked for a donation . Some people ask how much this should be and so we suggest a minimum of £20 GBP . Our Zoom painting demonstrations do take quite a bit of time in preparation and administration and your support is very much appreciated. With your generosity we can plan and run further sessions and, more importantly, provide a regular meeting place for creativity, camaraderie and fun. We hope that you enjoy the international, online painting community that we have created.
Once you have registered you will be provided with two links. The first is the Zoom link for you to join the session. Please note that the start time is 3.30pm (UK time, GMT) . This equates to 10.30am – East Coast USA; 9.30am Central Time USA; 8.30am – Mountain Time USA; 7.30am – Pacific Coast Time USA.
The second link is where you will find a sample line drawing, a more shaded line drawing to see how it will be developed, a value study, a practice painting, and a list of equipment and colours for your palette. If you would like to paint along with Randy, be warned that he works fast and you may like to have your own drawing ready.
After the event, you are invited to add your painting to the private gallery , where you will be able to view the same scene uploaded by your fellow painters on Zoom. Randy will comment on your painting if you post it within a week of the event. In addition, we will send you a link to a video that will enable to you revisit Randy’s step-by-step teaching.
When you have painted with Randy online, why not join him for real at the Watermill in Tuscany Italy next summer? We would love to welcome you to the Watermill. You can find more details of Randy’s week-long course, 13 to 20 May 2023 , here .
Randy’s background
Randy is from Colorado in United States and, as well as his workshops in the USA, he has taken painting groups all over the world. After a successful business career, he returned to his first love, watercolour painting. (He was taught by James Green, a founder member of the California School of Watercolor.) But Randy’s true passion proved to be to be in sharing his knowledge: enjoying the excitement of travel with fellow painters, helping them to create expressive paintings to enrich their experience. One of his students said: “He knows his stuff and he knows how to teach! Best watercolor instructor I have ever had!”
You can find out more about Randy’s style of teaching online by watching the edited video below from a Zoom session earlier this year, hosted by The Watermill at Posara: