Earlier this month, I opened the doors to the Sorting Office production house to run my first pet portrait workshop! The paints were out, the cake was cut and the kettle was on, ready for a delightful arty Sunday afternoon.

Prior to the event, I asked the lovely students to bring along or email me a photo of their fluffy models who would be the focus of the three hour workshop. But first, the warm up!

After a studio tour, I introduced the watercolour and gouache paints that I had spread out on the table. I demonstrated how to mix colours and create different consistencies with water to create layers, which are techniques we’d apply later on in the final portraits.

After a practise round of layering paints and having fun with colour, we moved onto the sketching stage using my lightbox. This gives us a faint outline and a starting point in the composition of the pet. We don’t need too much detail, as it’s more of a tool for to indicate where the features are.

Together (I painted my Charlie as the demonstration!) we began our pet portraits. It took about an hour and a half for the first layer with the watercolours, and another hour on top to apply the gouache details. For the next workshops (Saturday 2nd November is the next one in the calendar) I would cut down the introduction and warm up so the students can enjoy more time in the detail stage.

I had such a wonderful afternoon teaching this class. I was apprehensive at first as it was my first masterclass, but it was such a delight. The group was lovely and the art they produced was so individual to their own personal painting styles. It’s really interesting seeing different approaches using the same materials and techniques - how cool is the blue cat!