Category: meeting

Tim trained as studio apprentice to David Leach in the 1970s followed by two years at the Dartington Pottery Training Workshop. He also taught classes and ran workshops from his first studio which he set up with the aid of a grant awarded from The Crafts Council.

In 1983 Tim moved to South Tawton Pottery where he ran International Ceramics Summer Schools which attracted students from all over the world. After some years he returned to Bovey Tracey to share the studio with David Leach who was no longer taking students. In 1993 he set up and moved to his own workshop in Woodbury, East Devon.

He lectured part time at Exeter college in the 1990s and has been a guest lecturer at Plymouth College of Art and Plymouth University. He has lectured and run Masterclasses in Denmark, Italy, Hungary, Israel, China, Australia, Japan, Sweden, Germany as well as across the UK.

“The transformation of mud to art is a fascinating journey of evolutionary transition – peppered with risk-taking step changes. My work represents an ongoing dialogue between the technical demands of process, serendipity and the desire to impart something of the spirit, intent and character of the maker. Ultimately for me, each piece has to justify its existence with a quiet yet substantial presence.”

Paul Weaver is a full-time artist, tutor and demonstrator, based in Bristol, UK. His primary inspirations are light and atmospheric effects. Townscapes, markets and the bustle of the city are favourite subjects, as well as landscape, marine and coastal scenes. He currently specialises in watercolour, but also enjoys working in oil, acrylic and line and wash.

Paul will discuss the importance of regular sketching and drawing and how it plays a vital role in the creative process, covering pencil, pen and charcoal techniques. Sketching and drawing is a way of engaging with a subject and honing one’s visual awareness. It is a way of understanding form, depth, perspective, proportion, texture, light and shade in visual terms. It is a way of gathering reference and testing compositions for potential paintings. Paul will demonstrate his way of working, using pencil, pen or charcoal, then progressing to line and wash.

His workshop the following day will give the opportunity to put these ideas into action, and if the weather is good enough there will be the chance to get outside and sketch from life then return to the studio to develop the work.

Paul is proud to be a fully elected member of the Pure Watercolour Society. He has exhibited successfully for many years and won several awards. He is a regular contributor to ‘The Artist’ magazine and demonstrator for St Cuthbert’s Mill and Ken Bromley Art Supplies.

​An award-winning artist, Paul demonstrates and runs workshops for many art groups across the country, as well as tutoring painting holidays in the UK and abroad.

Melissa was born in Bermuda and lived there until she was seven years old. Whilst working in London as an 18 year old, Melissa attended St Martins School of Art part-time and attended part-time at Edinburgh College of Art whilst studying for her honours degree at Edinburgh University.

Her  early career was as a documentary film-maker for television. She was then commissioned to create large scale video projections in theatre and site specific settings for artists, dancers and actors. The life drawing continued throughout these years. As success grew for her paintings through group exhibitions, her time became more focussed around oil painting, further strengthened recently through explorations of the life form in clay.

This will be an illustrated talk showing the development of semi-abstraction alongside watching a demonstration using acrylics of how Melissa might go about constructing a painting using different tools, mark-making, reducing composition to a number of lines and series of shapes. Mixing a palette and discussion about colour. How we create lively juxtapositions of light and dark, hot and cold colours, soft and hard lines to enliven our art.

The workshop the following day on Friday 19^th June will build on this playful investigative spirit and be a chance for us to add to our toolkit so whatever style we then choose to paint in we have an increased vocabulary of mark-making, stronger grasp of composition and an adventurous spirit when mixing colours and using different tools. It will be a fun day of investigation and discovery with guided process in the morning and plenty of time for one to one tuition and feedback.

Oils or acrylics. Beginners welcome as well as more experienced.

Come along to the legendary TAG Christmas party.  Bring a plate of finger food to share for six.  Be prepared to have a fun and sociable evening with your arty friends – more details nearer the time.

Have you ever admired and appreciated the strength and beauty of the work of the Expressionists? This ground-breaking group of painters, derisively named the Fauves, or Wild Beasts, were responsible for liberating artists’ palettes and creating wonderful, vivid images of thick, brilliant colour. The main exponents were Matisse, Derain and Vlaminck. Their subject is often landscape and cityscape. They also worked on images of colourful interiors, often incorporating beautiful pattern and shape.

In this demonstration, Claire will show ways of embarking on a vivid, powerful Fauve-like painting.

Claire Western was brought up by the sea in Exmouth, Devon. All of her work begins and is inspired by her love of the sea, walking the coast path and sailing off the coasts of Devon and Cornwall. She has combined painting and teaching throughout her adult life and has exhibited and sold her work widely in the southwest over many years.  She was Head of Art at Queen’s College in Taunton. Since leaving there, she has established a very popular and wide-ranging series of courses for adults, based in Wellington, where she now lives. These encompass painting, drawing, printmaking and mixed media work.

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Chris has been an illustrator and artist for nearly all his working life and he lives and has his studio in Dorking, Surrey. He is mostly interested in landscape, townscape and coastal subjects but also still life.

His main preoccupation is with atmosphere, light and weather, and he endeavours to capture the fleeting changes and how it affects the scene before him. He prefers to work in the studio from location sketches and photographs, mostly in water-based media.

He will be demonstrating his approach to painting a coastal landscape using acrylic and mixed media.

Please note; this is a Monday evening.

Joe Webster is a contemporary landscape artist whose work explores the tension and interplay between the natural world and human impact upon it. Describing his practice as “landscape‑graffiti,” Joe layers wild and urban motifs to reflect the paradox of finding beauty, solace, and purpose in nature while also witnessing its degradation in the 21st century. His paintings capture what he calls today’s “broken‑beauty,” where rhythmic, geometric marks inspired by graffiti sit in contrast and conversation with the organic forms of the landscape.

Working extensively en plein air, Joe embraces the unpredictability of the elements, often exposing his canvases to rain, wind, and shifting weather. This process creates works that are shaped as much by nature as by the artist himself, resulting in surfaces alive with energy, dilution, erosion, and chance. In this talk, Joe will discuss the ideas behind his landscape‑graffiti approach, the emotional and environmental tensions that drive his work, and the exhilarating, high‑risk process of painting outdoors in wild conditions. He will share insights into how he balances urban and natural influences, how weather becomes an active collaborator in his paintings, and how he captures the visceral, living quality of the landscapes he knows so well.

Members are welcome to arrive from 5.45 for a coffee or a glass of wine or a soft drink from the bar.  The AGM will start promptly at 6:15, and we will have a brief break for coffee/more drink at 6:45.

Pamela Campbell-Johnston is an art historian with over 30 years experience.  I was lucky enough to hear her last year, and when I told her about our 60^th anniversary, she rose to the challenge to do a lecture to help us celebrate – ‘A decade of radical change in Society and Art’: British Art & Architecture 1960-1970’.

Bring along one painting or print which you would like some advice on from Phil.

Naomi Hart is an Exeter based artist.  After completing her Art and Design degree in 2002, she has developed a practice which has involved collaboration with scientists from all over the world – from the Arctic to the Galapagos, Canada and Australia.  Naomi makes multimedia and multidisciplinary artwork, using drawing, paint, photography, sculpture, installation, walking, performance and sound to investigate the world.  Her work is frequently focussed on water and marine environments, and the impact of environmental issues in the natural world, finding creative and astonishing ways of representing the threats to fragile and unique environments.

Naomi will talk about a few of her artistic collaborations with scientists, using examples from the Arctic and closer to home. There’ll be a small exhibition of work, including some sketchbooks, and cards will be for sale.