Why not have a go at acrylics, oils or pencil, or even painting on the iPad? Ian Coleman is running three workshops this term at John Kyrle High School during the evenings.

All the courses are for beginners to intermediates with one to one help. Ian will show you how to match the right surface and brush to create the desired effect along with different brush skills and techniques in oil and acrylics.

Ian is a local professional artist, designer and illustrator with 35 years experience in publishing, advertising and art galleries with a special interest in natural history and figurative art, receiving two awards of excellence from the American Society of Animal Artists and illustrated two Shark books for the BBC. He has been teaching art workshops for the past 12 years with weekend courses, day courses and evening courses. His book features many of the techniques learnt over his career in ’Painting with Acrylics’ by Crowood Press ISBN 978-1-84797-883-7 £18.99 with £5 worth of freebies if purchased from Ian’s website colemangallery.com.

This term it’s ’Mini-Masters’ where Ian takes another four classic painters, pop/formal artist Patrick Caulfield, surrealist Joan Miro, post impressionist Georges Seurat, and abstract expressionist Willem de Kooning and shows you how to re-create their styles in miniature with your own composition and thereby learning new methods of painting. The emphasis is on having practical fun in an encouraging group of like minded fellow artists of all ages, hopefully discovering new inspirations to try out something new. The course runs on Thursdays from January 11th until March 8th, from 6.45pm-9pm at John Kyrle High School.

Starting on Tuesday, February 6th and running for four evenings, Ian will be tutoring a pencil workshop, using a variety of surfaces and trying out an array of pencils and drawing tools. For all levels of experience, 2B or not 2B!

Later in February it’s bring out your iPads (3 and above including mini-iPad) and discover the amazing art you can create using the Procreate drawing app (only £5.99 from the app store). Ian will demonstrate how to get the most out of this app creating graphics for your local event or works of art reproduced on canvas. This may be a daytime or evening session depending on demand. Please register interest on 07951 122543.