Are You A Beginner?

Many years ago, I went to an in-person landscape workshop with the artist Mary Gilkerson. Even though I’ve been an artist my entire life, I’d never learned how to do plein air paintings and I wanted to learn how.

Since I’ve spent years painting, I knew all about the basics of art, color, design, and composition, so I thought I might pick up just a few goodies from her class.

It was a small group of artists sitting around a table and after we introduced ourselves and told our experience with art, I felt pretty good about having plenty of knowledge around this.

But, much to my surprise, I was the worst in the class. Seriously. The other students had taken an online course of Mary’s so they were way ahead of where I was. It was here that I first learned so many things I didn’t know I needed to learn.

For instance, I learned about notans and how important they are in planning your landscape painting. I LOVED learning about notans…had no idea what they were before this class.

If you don’t know what they are let me tell you…

...a notan is a Japanese design concept using black and white to study the elements in your painting. You reduce everything down to a black and white study which makes it easy to view your design and composition before beginning to put color.

Example of a notan, as seen on the Mystic Museum of Art website

Then we learned how to attach the small canvas we were going to paint on to a larger piece of white foam core. Boy was this helpful.

Now it was time to begin mixing colors. Well, my gosh, Mary told us to premix all our colors on the palette before painting so we could see how they all looked together. Genius. What a great concept. I had never done that before but now I do.

So now is the moment to get brush to canvas… But wait. We’re not using a brush, just a palette knife. Nope, I’d never used a palette knife before. She took some extra time with me, showing me a few tricks since everyone else already knew how to do that.

I came away from that workshop having learned so many things I didn’t realize I was going to learn. And I still incorporate a lot of those in my painting process now.

So, I went into this workshop learning way more than I thought I would.

Speaking about being a beginner, I wanted to let you know that right now I’m in the process of filming a beginner course for abstract artists. I’m designing the course to be for anyone who has never picked up a paintbrush as well as for those of you who are experienced but want to learn more.

My focus is to help you understand all the basics, maybe in a different way than you already know, and to take you through my simple 5-step process to create successful abstract paintings.

I’m planning on offering it in October this year.

If you are at all interested in learning more about this course, “Fun Abstract Painting for the Absolute Beginner,” then you’ll want to get on the waitlist. That way you’ll be the first to know all the details about when it will be available and any updates.

Click this link HERE to add your name on the waitlist. More information will be coming, but I just wanted to let you know it’s coming.

And if you are in the Art with Adele Academy you’ll be able to get 20 percent off the price.

Stay tuned. And even if you think you aren’t a beginner, like I did in Mary’s class, there’s a good chance you’ll learn things you didn’t know.

P.S. Click HERE to get on the waitlist for my new course coming out in October called “Fun Abstract Painting for the Absolute Beginner.”

* Click HERE to learn about the Art with Adele Academy.

* Click HERE to get my FREE minicourse, “Kickstart Your Abstract Painting.”