demonstrations

Monthly meetings are held on the first Wednesday of the month, except January, at which visiting, well-known artists give demonstrations. Members and visitors are welcome to these demonstrations, for a small entry fee of $5 members, $7 non-members. They are held at Castle Glen Community Centre, 157 Ridgecrop Drive, Castle Hill ( at the rear of the carpark at Knightsbridge shopping centre).

2020 Demonstrations - Wednesday 7.30pm
5 February
​Jean Hurley "Encaustic Painting"
Encaustic painting is a mixed media technique that involves using heated beeswax to which coloured pigments have been added. The liquid/paste is then applied to a surface — usually prepared wood, although canvas and other materials are often used.
Once Jean was introduced to encaustic art a great love affair began using coloured beeswax as a medium.  Come and see how such beautiful works are created.
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4 March
​Gloria Liang "Birds and Nature"
Gloria is a Chinese/Australian Artist who practices both traditional and modern watercolour painting. She is a passionate painter of Australian birds and nature. She will demonstrate how she marries her Chinese traditional techniques with depiction of Australian themed artworks of our native species.
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1 April
Julianne Ross Allcorn "Watercolour and Mixed Media on Board"
Julianne Ross Allcorn has been a practicing artist and art teacher for over 20 years, painting in watercolour and mixed media on board. She has been a finalist and winner in numerous awards and has had solo exhibitions throughout Sydney and participated in a number of group exhibitions.
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6 May
​Andrew Antoniou "Imagination"
Andrew Antoniou – Andrew works across several mediums. Whether he is drawing in charcoal, painting in oils or print making from his etching he creates works that are densely populated with figures in fantastical settings telling stories from imagination. He has won many awards and his works are in the collections of The Australian National Gallery, The Art Gallery of New South Wales, many other Australian galleries as well as international collections.
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3 June
Christian Holmes "Alla Prima Portrait - Oils"
Christian Holmes is a talented young figurative artist based in Sydney, who teaches at the Julian Ashton Art School. He has a keen interest in classical drawing and painting techniques with a focus on portraiture. In his work he strives to capture a likeness of his subject quickly which imbues the image with life and light.  He is dedicated to the study of the techniques of old and new masters, attending numerous workshops and regular life drawing sessions.
Christian will demonstrate a method of painting an alla prima portrait in oils from a reference photo and will show how to simplify the drawing process using a limited palette to achieve nice light effects and harmony.  Alla prima (wet-on-wet), is a painting technique in which layers of wet paint are applied to previously administered layers of wet paint.
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1 July
Cecilia Mok "Surface Designs"
Cecilia’s oil paintings, both land and sea scapes, are fresh and impressionistic, however it is her “surface designs” that we will be asking Celia to demonstrate as these beautiful designs, which are reminiscent of Japanese papers, are something completely different to what we are normally exposed to. 
Cecilia works as an artist and surface designer in Sydney and also teaches at a children’s art studio. She is drawn to themes of wonder, storytelling and the beauty of the natural world. Her surface designs are explorations of rich colour palettes, movement and flow, and decorative illustration. 
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5 August
Richard Chao "Wonderful People - Watercolour"
Richard Chao is a world-renowned watercolourist living in Sydney, Australia. Taking a contemporary perspective, he depicts his interpretation on the human world in his realistic paintings. Richard tries out the possibilities of watercolour as a medium with huge size paintings. His models are people from every corners of the world with diverse and unique customs and cultures, as well as religions, which amaze him.
In recent times he has been the winner or finalist in over 40 prizes and his art works have been exhibited in 5 continents.  His paintings are collected by museums, galleries and private collectors. Richard travels around the world to international art exhibitions and art festivals.
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2019 Demonstrations - Wednesday 7.30pm
6 February
Wayne Harrison “Airbrushing – Fine Art”
Wayne has been airbrushing over 35 years and his artworks have won awards in both USA and Australia.  He says airbrushing is something everyone can learn to do - learn how to use the Airbrush, maintain it and do your own special effects and “trade” tricks. ​
6 March     
John Haycraft  “Watercolour Painting”
John is an Artist, Architectural Illustrator, Teacher and Author who studied with Lloyd Rees, American Watercolourist Charles Reid, Joseph Zbukvic and Eugen Chisnicean.  Trained as a perspective artist he has over the years developed his interest in watercolour as a medium for expressive painting particularly well adapted for plein-air work.  He is a master in his medium and is a principal of the architectural illustration firm Haycraft Duloy.
3 April     
Chris Seale  “Painting the Bush”
Chris paints beautiful bush scenes mostly in acrylics inspired by the Hawkesbury where she lives. She won the Traditional Acrylic Section of our own Orange Blossom Festival as well as other prizes including first prize at the Royal Easter Show.  She will share with us her unique style and insights which she has developed during a lifetime of drawing and painting.
This will be an opportunity to see a little of what we can be learned at her workshop which will be held on 2 June.
May – No demonstration due to roof replacement at Castle Glen
5 June     
Jan Cristaudo  “Abstraction”
Jan hails from the Northern Beaches where she draws inspiration from the environment.  She is an abstract artist who is driven in the first instance by colour.  Jan has exhibited extensively and teaches at the School of Colour and Design, Willoughby Art Centre and Julian Ashton Art School.  Let Jan inspire you towards abstraction or just get an insight into another painting genre.
We will be holding a workshop with Jan “An Introduction to Abstract Art” on 4 August.
3 July     
Dianne Delandro  “Techniques with Coloured Pencils”
Dianne is a local artist who, after many years of being an acrylic abstract artist, is now specialising in colour pencil work.  She will explain what art supplies she uses and why, the dos and don'ts of working with colour pencils, as well as short cuts and handy hints.
Dianne's art can be seen on www.bluethumb.com.au, where she is a featured artist.  She is also a member of "Colour in Your  Life" and "The Australian Art Movement".​
7 August     
Tricia Taylor  “Pastel Portrait or Figures”
Master Pastellist Tricia Taylor is from Sydney and has had 20 years of experience with pastels.  Her work is  recognised for capturing light in her impressionistic style of realism.Although painting portraits and figures in pastel can be daunting Tricia will show simple methods of layering to achieve amazing colour control.  She will focus on how to mix colour in pastel including skin colour and colours in warm light.
Tricia will be teaching for us at our first workshop for 2020 on the 24 February.
4 September     
David El-Melky  “Hyper-Realism”
David has been drawing and painting since childhood, in fact he drew his first portrait at 7 years of age.  No wonder that he won first prize at the 2018 OBF for traditional oils with his beautiful portrait of his grandchild.  He studied a fine
arts degree and worked as a graphic artist, fashion designer, photography and painting at night.
Painting has been his life’s passion and he challenges himself with Hyper-realism and surrealist paintings.  For the last 10 years he has been a tutor and loves every bit of it.  We are lucky to have the opportunity to be given an insight into David’s process.
2 October     
Sharon Moroney  “Charcoal & Watercolour”
Sharon began work with Hanna Barbara Aust. And Burbank Studios on animated feature films, and freelanced for Disney.  Her work has been chosen from hundreds of artists worldwide to appear in several prestige books and magazine, and she is featured artist in Australian Artist Magazine, May 2019.
Sharon likes to cross boundaries between realism and impressionism working in any media, but more recently combining graphite, charcoal, watercolour and pastel.  At present she is working on a series of endangered animals but also loves to paint and draw people – to try and capture the essence of the subject.
6 November
​Deidre Morrison  “Acrylic Pour”
Deidre Morrison is an artist and an art teacher. She holds a Diploma in Art Education, is a teacher with the Hawkesbury campus of the Macquarie Community College, University of Third Age and privately.
She is proficient with many mediums – oils, watercolour, acrylics, pastel, pencil, charcoal, screen-prints, drawing, illustration, murals, posters, print making, printed cloth and greeting cards. Her works are regularly exhibited in Australia and overseas. Deidre has written articles on art for newspapers and magazines.
Deidre will be sharing her acrylic pouring techniques so come along and see just how free spirited us artists can be.