Charles Reid at Crantock 8 - 12th October

Charles Reid's Palette - A Craig Young Paintbox - he has four all told.

There is one feature of Charles palette which is fairly recent. Due to the problems that  occur when travelling with wet paints a mess is likely, and much cleaning up thereafter. Therefore Charles has replaced some of the tube paints with half pans. He puts them side by side in the wells as you can see above. His preference for pans seems to be Winsor & Newton. He was very complimentary toward them as they moisten easily.

On Friday morning we are off to Crantock Bay in Cornwall for Charles Reids second 2011 painting course in the UK. This week he is at Burford in Oxfordshire. I attended the Burford course four years ago. Note added 14 Oct: I was wrong about dates. Burford follows Crantock starting  16 Oct. 

Charles with the member of staff who sat for the portrait study

 The Finished Work roughly half sheet size on Fabriano Artistico

Then came Catalonia, actually our first visit to Spain and very enjoyable it was for both of us. It worked very well as a painting course and holiday, which made it special.

Roses, Catalonia - First demo close to the hotel facing the beach

After Burford I went on a further course in Catalonia with the wife as non-painting partner. This was a ten day trip with the painting course in two four day sections - a day off in the middle. This worked extremely well, in effect almost two courses in one.

This was taken in Girona. Judi Whitton and Don Glynn (he makes the easels see previous feature) are sitting in front of Charles. Both are well-known professional artists and I have attended five of Judi's courses over the course of the last ten years or so, three of them at this same Crantock Bay Hotel. The man in the red jacket, Orlando a doctor formerly from Colombia, a superb artist completely self taught, has modelled his tecnique on that of Charles, purely up to Catalonia from books and videos. At every course I have attended  there have been some professional artists which shows the esteem in which Charles is held.

One of Orlando's Paintings.

The course in Spain was organized by EPC (Enjoy Painting in Catalonia) run by the charming and very efficient Angela Barbi. You can see an EPC video on Youtube. Don Glynn was involved in an executive capacity and has known Angela for years

Mick Carney of  the Painting Struggle www.thepaintingstruggle.blogspot.com/ .  After Catalonia I next attended the Urchfont course in 2009. Urchfont, which is in Wiltshire, England, was where I met Mick, a fellow North-Easterner. Although my family left the North East many years ago I still retain strong ties. Sadly though he supports Sunderland football (soccer) club, whereas I am a Newcastle United supporter!  Mick is staying with us on Thursday night to break his long journey from the North-East and we travel together to Cornwall on Friday.

Graham - an Urchfont resident and local historian.

This was the Portrait study with which Charles opened the Urchfont week. It captured the subject beautifully. I remarked afterwards to Charles that he was on form and got a smile in reply. I said the same to Judy his wife. It set the scene for the week and all the demos were very good, as a set superior to those I'd seen  previously. He seems to me to be a mood painter and as, in his own words, each painting is an adventure, some demos seem to work better than others.

A fantastic Flower-based still life begins to emerge.

This will be my last post until I return from Cornwall. I am hoping to interview Charles for the blog and will report in detail on the course. Sadly Crantock is closing as a hotel at the end of the year so the painting courses, involving several artists, will end. Judi Whitton in particular, who is there this week, will miss it and so will many of those who attended her courses. 

Judi demonstrating at Crantock

Just a few words on future plans, for those who may be interested. The next three colours to feature will be Cadmium Orange, Paynes Gray and Indigo. I am also planning another on mixing greens using Cobalt Turquoise Light as suggested by Rembrandt (no this is the other one). Apart from my own activities and those of the Avon Valley Artists and Bathampton groups, I have tentative plans for items on brushes, papers and whatever else springs to mind. Note added 7.45pm: The first draft of this was sloppy as it was rushed so I have `cleaned' it up a little. Apologies to those who may have already read it.