Summer Courses Programme 2018

Nature into Print (Aluminium etching)

July 3 – 5,    10 am to 4 pm

Tutor : Jenny Graham

Fee: £180

Using aspects of the landscape surrounding Dove Studios, students will explore different etching techniques. Discussions about creative interpretation of the landscape will be combined with practical exercises on how to create line, tone and texture using a variety of etching processes.

Aluminium Etching by Jenny Graham

 

Making Prints for Books (Various printmaking techniques and simple book binding)

July 10 – 12,   10 – 4pm

Tutor: Bronwen Bradshaw with Pennie Elfick

Fee: £180

The aim of this course is for participants to make a handmade book containing printed images and maybe words too. Drypoint, collagraph, relief printing and monoprint can all be used, with plenty of wide ranging tuition on hand to help with the different techniques, including basic bookbinding.

Fold book of etchings by Bronwen Bradshaw

 

The Handwritten Word (Free-wheeling calligraphy)

July 14/15,   10 – 4pm

Tutor: Kathryn John

Fee: £120

At a time when our lives and lists exist in a digital world, we will spend a weekend together getting back in touch with the flow of the handwritten word, with full permission to get it wrong and to make a mess, using a variety of writing materials – including vegetable and oak gall ink – and experimental processes.

Writing by Kathryn John (Beetroot ink)

 

Mokuhanga Stage 1 (Japanese water-based woodblock printing)

August 8,9,10,   10 – 4pm

Tutor: Robin Frood

Fee: £180

This 3-day workshop will explore the Japanese art of woodblock printing, known as Mokuhanga, with participants producing a final series of prints on a theme of their choice. This water-based technique is very ecological in its use of materials, and is currently undergoing a great revival in contemporary art worldwide.

Mokuhanga print by Robin Frood

 

All courses include basic studio materials in the fee, but paper and plates (aluminium, wood blocks, acrylic sheets etc) are extra at cost.

If you would like to enrol on a course, please download the application form here:

Application Form for courses

and email to bronbradshaw@yahoo.com, or send to Bronwen Bradshaw, Dove Studios, Butleigh, Glastonbury, Somerset BA6 8TL, together with a deposit that will secure your place on the course. All deposits are non- refundable, unless we can fill your place from a waiting list. The full fee will be due by June 1st 2018; you will receive a reminder about this.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Handwritten Word: details of course

The Handwritten Word

July 14 & 15 2018

Tutor: Kathryn John

At Dove Studios, Butleigh

Course times: 10am – 4pm

 

When was the last time you sat down and wrote with ink and paper? Scribbled out a misspelled word or found spots of leaked ink upon your fingers from a malfunctioning pen?

Markmaking

At a time when our lives and lists, stories and notes have become part of a digital world we will spend a weekend together getting back in touch with the flow of the handwritten word. We will explore using experimental processes to get us moving and making marks.

Sgraffito with charcoal rubbed in

With full permission to get it wrong, to make a mess, we will return to the joy of what it is to write with our whole bodies and not just the tips of our fingers. Using handmade vegetable, oak gall and berry inks and a variety of writing instruments – including handcrafted tools!

Kathryn John: homemade beetroot ink written with a stick

We will re-find the beauty in own scripts, along with cheating our way to some mouthwatering calligraphy. A fun workshop that will begin with us exploring the land at The Dove for inspiration, and end with us taking home a finished handwritten piece of work and a renewed love for our own handwriting.

Kathryn John’s handwriting on the Dove Arts flyer (homemade oak gall ink)

If you are interested in coming on this course, please email bronbradshaw@yahoo.com, or message dovearts on facebook.

Nature into Print: details of course

Etching by Jenny Graham

NATURE INTO PRINT

July 3 – 5, 2018, 10 am to 4 pm

Tutor : Jenny Graham

Fee: £180

Using aspects of the natural world students will explore different aluminium etching techniques. Discussions about creative interpretation of the environment will be combined with practical exercises on how to create line, tone and texture using a variety of processes.

Students in Jenny’s last year’s course printing etching plates

Etching by Caroline Dowdell

Etching detail by Lin Hawkins

Participants will begin by collecting visual information from the landscape surrounding the workshop. Sketches will be turned into simple line etchings and then other printmaking processes will be added to create tone and texture. Students will be encouraged to use a creative and experimental approach to the subject working with both figurative and abstract techniques.

So, if you want to learn aluminium etching techniques (always experimental!), or improve skills you already have, using the lovely surroundings of the Dove as inspiration, this is the course for you. Email bronbradshaw@yahoo.com or message dovearts on facebook if you would like to reserve a place.

 

Etching by Jenny Graham

Making Prints for Books; details of course

Making Prints for Books is a 3 day intensive course combining printing with bookbinding, with Bronwen Bradshaw and Pennie Elfick. Dates: 10, 11 & 12 July

Concertina Book ‘Lauzerte’ with a series of etchings printed as a strip

The aim of this course is for participants to make a handmade book containing hand printed artwork and maybe words too. The facilities of the Dove print studio will be available for students to make book content, using drypoint and/or lino and woodcut, monoprint and collagraph, with plenty of guidance and tuition on hand to advise on choices and the techniques involved.

The idea of having 2 tutors is that one (PE) will teach the printmaking and the other (BB) will keep her hands clean and help with the bookbinding. We are hoping for a good take up on this course so that we can have 2 tutors, otherwise Bron will be doing both sorts of teaching…so let’s hope!

Pages from ‘Caves of Ice’ – different versions of the same print put together in book form

You may, however, already have prints that you can bring along and we can work out how to make them into a book. Or you may want to do a bit of both: printing and book binding. The joy of this course is that – as long as you wash your hands inbetween – you can move from one activity to another. Here are some forms your book could take:

“A walk up the lane” – a series of monoprints with wax resist and acrylic wash in the process of being bound.

“Tarantella” torn up large prints with computer generated text on layout paper

‘Venice Variations’ – an origami-type folded paper binding with etchings and computer text.

Students joining this course should have some experience in printmaking, but they do not need to have done bookbinding. The forms of bookbinding that we will use are non orthodox and therefore open to all kinds of invention and experimentation.

Hope to see you here! Email bronbradshaw@yahoo.com if you are interested.

 

 

 

 

The weekend of workshops

Autumn was at its loveliest for the Dove Weekend of Workshops. 40 people came over the 2 days, and there was barely a break in proceedings,the atmosphere was so concentrated.

In case you were wondering, this is not a pile of rubbish at the back of the workshops: it is the still life arrangement for the Abstract Drawing course, run by Pennie Elfick. Somehow, the above translated into this (or maybe this was a different exercise: I wasn’t paying attention…)

Pennie’s second course was colour mixing in oils. She took two different pigments of each of the primary colours, and 3 hours later,  these were the results. In the garden, Michael Fairfax was teaching making musical instruments from willow pollard. Shavings flew for an hour or twoAnd then instruments started to emerge. This was actually made from apple, a far harder wood to work as it was very dry, but Teresa managed it and came up with this made to measure instrument.Here is Clare’s willow harp In the studio, Variations on the Fold book were being carefully constructed, tutored by Jane Paterson. Jane is being urged to run a handmade books class – at the moment there isn’t one here since my handmade books class became the independent group ABCD (Artists’ Book Club Dove). Outside, Fiona Hingston’s Walking and Making groups were coming up with the following The day was impossibly beautiful, and the rich autumnal colours of the gathered materials only added to this. No pictures of the Ever Useful Coptic binding course, as the photographer was also the tutor (Bron Bradshaw); the students were so concentrated, that there was no time to even think of photos. But books were produced, and I hope they will prove to be ever useful.

Good comments in the feedback forms, and great enthusiasm for this kind of workshop format. So keep an eye on the Dove Arts page: we may be advertising another weekend, although not until the Spring. Thanks to everyone who came and who taught: it was a great weekend with a wonderful atmosphere.