Last year I put together a virtual exhibition of work from previous Abstractify students to share with you. It was such a great way to showcase their beautiful creations and the possibilities the course offers, I decided to do another this year!

As before, I’ve broken it down week by week, so if you’re considering joining the course you can see the kinds of things you’ll be doing. And if not, then just feast your eyes and be inspired! 🙂

Students range from art school graduates to total newbies, so don’t worry about ‘where you are’ with your art. The focus is experimentation and exploration in a fun and supportive environment; a chance to explore what makes your art heart sing and start to develop it into something true to you.

“Through all these Abstractify lessons, we were never told HOW to paint or draw. It was all about inspiration, encouragement, possibilities, and many very well-chosen demonstrations and videos, and I for one, have painted and completed more in this past month than I have ever before. And it was MY work, not a copy of someone else’s.”

Elizabeth Winters

Week One: Initial Explorations

This week is about warming up, loosening up, and starting to release those old habits that have kept us stuck in attempting to be realistic when we want to be more expressive. It’s about building confidence with simple and fun exercises, and an exploration of marks and materials.

Natalie Stanley

Sara Wallace

Exploring soft pastels and charcoal by Barbara Marie Steele

Week Two: People

We explore the figure and portraiture this week. Rather than trying to create likenesses, however, we come at it from a much more expressive, loose angle. You can see just from the figure paintings below that although we’re all doing the same exercises, already there is a distinctness to each student’s work.

Various interpretations of the figure painting exercise

Expressive figure by Michele Silvetti-Schmitt

Blind contour portraits by Sheila Hodgkiss

Week Three: Places

This week we go en plein air, weather and circumstances permitting, and take our inspiration from the landscape. We look at painting the view through a window – a device used by many artists – as well as creating abstractified landscapes and, as we do every week, looking at the work of artists in this area in a slideshow.

Andy Getch’s view through a window

An abstractified landscape by Cassandra Arnold

An abstractified landscape by Elaine Morgan

Ian Stubbs’ view through a window

Week Four: Things

‘Things’ being still life. 🙂  And we’ll also push it into full abstraction, looking at how to make paintings that ‘work’ with no or few recognisable elements.

Alison Kaczmarek’s still life exploration

Elizabeth Winter

Cassandra Arnold’s reworked still life

Esther De Boer’s abstract

“I NEVER have confidence doing art straight from my head…but am breaking lots of barriers and fears here doing this awesome course.”

Rosie Hughes

It never ceases to amaze and delight me how with just a little structure, a lot of encouragement, and the willingness to experiment, discoveries can be made, and diverse and richly expressive art can come to life. We all have something unique to say, and it’s totally possible – and not as hard as you think – to find your way of saying it.

If you’re at a point on your artist’s path where you feel you could benefit from some guidance to expand on what’s uniquely ‘you’ about your art, Abstractify might be for you. If it’s not currently open for registration, you can sign up on the info page to receive an email alert when that next happens. Find the full details by clicking on the image.