Welcome!

Hello and welcome to Experimental Still Life - the self paced version.

You can listen to this introduction or read my words below.

In this first module, Let's Draw you will start a daily drawing practice and you will not beat yourself up if you dip in and out of this. Make a start, with just 5 minutes a day. You'll be trying a lot of different drawing exercises to open your mind up to how expressive drawing can be and of course this can translate into your painting later in the course.

You're also going to settle in and familiarise yourself with the course platform. You can read what materials you might need to buy and it's very likely that you will have everything you need for the first module already. I suggest you don't buy anything unless you have to. A gelli plate could be worth investing in; go for the largest you can afford.

In this first module you will also assess where you are right now with your work, what you love and what you want to improve AND what inspires you. This is something you will be reevaluating throughout the course.

You'll see that there's a suggested reading list and I invite you to contribute to it with any arty read that you think would enhance our practice and thoughts on art-making generally, still-life painting and the business of being an artist . Please comment under the appropriate section and I will add your suggestions to the text.

You'll also find instructions on how to join the optional group here and communicate with me while you're actively working on the course in the next "Housekeeping" lesson.

This quote from Mary Fedden sums up the attitude I really want you all to feel and remember when you go through each module:

Let inspiration in. It often catches us off guard when we are relaxing. For me this happens in the bath or when I am out on a walk and I feel a sudden urge to get home and make a start on something. Wherever this happens for you make sure you have some way of remembering these ideas - a notebook to jot them down or a 'phone to record onto. The sooner you take action without overthinking the better. If inspiration comes it is meant for you. Big or small. So if something other than still life arises while you're working on this course, indulge this. You are here to experiment and go beyond what I show you because YOU are the key element in your work.

Even so, you might be surprised at the variety that still life as a subject can offer, as you learn about different ways of portraying what you see or imagine. Through experimentation, you're going to discover new ways of working, your preferred approaches to acrylic painting and how you love to tackle the subject of still life, which is incredibly diverse.

By the end of our time together, if you commit to working through each of the modules, you will have explored working at different scales; moving from experimental observational work to intuitive still-life painting and then to abstracting your still-lifes in a way that suits you and then you will experiment with scaling up using your favourite approach/es.

You'll find that you can't help but realise your preferences from all the experiments you do here and from your own inspirations. Your unique and preferred way of seeing will emerge. Your drawing skills will have improved substantially and you'll have a stronger sense of yourself as an artist, whether you decide to concentrate on Still Life painting in the future or not. It's likely that no matter what subject matter you work with hereafter your mark-making and process will have developed and strengthened.  

The course is designed to be sequential, though as this is self-paced it's up to you how you do it. If you feel that you are enjoying an aspect of the course early on so much that you don't want to move on to another section for a while that is wonderful!

There is plenty to inspire you over possibly years to come. I will be adding new material from time to time; refreshing and replacing what is here. You will see a few bonus videos in each section that were filmed in 2025 during the ESL Experience.

Go down those rabbit holes! Best wishes for a creative ride!