Painting with Friends

There really is nothing like sharing a creative adventure with good friends.  This past weekend I got to do just that at the tail end of my friend, Carolyn's two week visit to the island.  We thankfully stumbled upon local artist, Alison Watt's weekend class in Surfacing.  So we bundled ourselves up and headed to Nanaimo where we boarded a very small ferry to take us over to Protection Island, home of Alison's studio.  Truly a wonderful experience.  It reminded me of being at my folks' cabin in northern Saskatchewan.  It's quiet and isolated.  Cars are few while golf carts and bikes abound.  Alison met us at the ferry dock the first day to guide us on our walk across the small island to her place.  Six of us met on the ferry ride over and another from the island joined us and we cozied-up together in the studio for 2 days of painting fun and exploration.  After a few warm up exercises we all tackled our personal version of poppies over a textured background.

It was fascinating to see how everyone's painting turned out. They were all absolutely fantastic, (a testament to Alison's instructional style), and all had very different "personalities", even though the subject and reference photo was the same.  Great way to spend the weekend.  Thanks ladies!