Art Scholars Workshop at the Royal West of England Academy 2009

On Thursday 5th March, fourteen art scholars gathered outside the Royal West of England Academy on Queens Road. They were there to create artwork in response to a theme on portraiture, which would lead them to firstly consider the formal elements regarding correct proportion, then develop strategies to communicate mood, feeling and emotion.

Maxine Relton led the workshop. She is an Academician at the gallery, and a well known artist. She has exhibited her work widely, in such venues as London’s Royal Academy and Whitechapel Gallery. She is also familiar with the work of the department, having been one of our artists in residence just a few years previously. She accompanied us on our Year 8 Art trip to Tate Britain and Kew Gardens last year, which allowed her to familiarise herself with some of the aims and objectives of art at Clifton.

On the day, the scholars were given the opportunity to gel as a group, and the intention was to create momentum and accelerate progress through inspired practice. The workshop started with an analysis of a range of drawing materials like graphite and charcoal, thinking particularly about how to convey emotion through the making of different kinds of marks. Challenging the accepted conventions and extending drawing practice was achieved by developing portrait images of expressive faces using black and white emulsion paint applied with very large decorators’ brushes. When used to construct portrait heads on a giant scale, the results were quite dynamic and powerful. The paintings fully conveyed the mood, feeling and emotion observed in each chosen face.

The day was concluded by a quick tour of the gallery, where we were able to admire some of the graffiti paintings that were being created for the RWA’s latest exhibition, and question some of the artists.