Originally from the Cotswolds, Christine Varley has been working since 1987 as a Pet and Animal Portrait Artist, She is now recognised as one of the leading Artists in her field exhibiting at Crufts and major Horse Trial events.  Christine visited the society in April 2026 to talk about her art-life and demonstrate her watercolour portrait techniques applied to animals…

March 2026 already! and Cordell Garfield visited the society to talk us through his methodology for portrait painting in oils witnessed by another great turn out from the society members.  

2026 got of to great start with the majority of the society members, 40+, coming out to hear Nick Logan talk us through portrait painting and colour diversity.  Although Nick didn’t get to finish a painting on the evening his insights into how skin tones and shadows can be constructed, introducing the “skin tone sphere” and demonstration using his arm…

Hi Everyone Just taking a short breather after yesterday’s Art & Craft Fair!! It was a lovely day. Thank you to our wonderful stallholders, who put on such a great display of talent and our small band of fantastic volunteers who worked hard selling raffle tickets, selling cakes and serving drinks – we couldn’t have run the Fair without you –…

Alix Almond came to demonstrate her linocut print making techniques to the society in November 2025.  A former teacher, Alix is now a full time linocut artist focussing on animals and birds and gave an interesting demonstration about the process of cutting and printing. More information about Alix can be found by following the link https://www.alixalmond.com/

17 Members enjoyed a day with DJ from www.artbydj.co.uk, who took us through a Woodlight Light tutorial in acrylics. It was a busy day and we learned several new techniques in terms of colour mixing and paint application and ate lots of cake, what’s not to like! The resulting paintings were really impressive as you can hopefully see in all the…

October 2025 demonstration with Darren Awang, Destruction Arts or Dazzler.18 depending on the art I guess was witnessed by another full turnout from the society.  Darren told us about his life, growing up in Liverpool, and how he got into art and how he developed his unique social history art talking through the process. More about Darren can be found…

September 2025!  The year nearly over and Sue Chatterton finally made it to the society after an issue on her previously planned date.  non the less Sue demonstrated her watercolour techniques in lion painting to much affect in front of another near capacity society       About Sue https://www.suechatterton.co.uk/ Painting is fun and Sue firmly believes it should be…

The 2025 exhibition was another great success with over 160 paintings displayed.  Once again the painting standard demonstrated by our artists has set the bar high for next time.  36 of the paintings were sold over the weekend so very well done to those artists!. Friday evening the exhibition was opened with a cheese and wine party held for members…

Sarah Miles Workshop 8th August 2025.   Sarah Miles Workshop  Sarah Miles came to see us earlier in the year with her Textures in Watercolour Puffin/Sea Scape and we had great feedback on how you all enjoyed seeing the texture techniques. As a result Sarah came back to undertake a workshop day! This time slightly different – working with charcoal to outline…

On a hot day in August, a very healthy number of the society members came to witness Ian McManus demonstrate his watercolour art in painting an architectural scene of a homestead, interesting of a farm house where 80% of the world carrot seeds are produced but lets not let that get in the way of a great demonstration by Ian.…

July 2025 and David Wilcox entertained the society with his demonstration focusing on ballet dancers, without actually painting ballet dancers – paint the shadows and hey presto we have the dancers appear before our eyes!   About David: https://www.davidwilcoxpaintings.co.uk/ I was born and educated in the Black Country, West Midlands.  After studying painting and Art History at Bournville School of Art,…

The May 2025 demonstration was also a BCAF event, as such the society welcomed an additional 6 persons to our gathering requiring some additional seating to be added to what was already a near full house to see Anne Guest.  Anne told us all about the Cyanotype process, an early photographic process that creates blueprints but is now more commonly…

Just wanted to say thank you to our small band of helpers for a fantastic day yesterday at our 10 May Fair – lots of visitors, lovely stalls, brilliant cafe and we raised £450 for the society to continue our operation. We had 19 pictures in our WW2 VE Day Anniversary Competition and what a great variety of pictures and…

A really good turn out for March, ~40 members, came to witness Sarah Miles demonstrate seascape watercolours with added texture demonstrations.  Textures included: Lace, Clingfilm, Bubbles, Rice, Salt and twine.  Sarah’s painting method takes too long for a 2 hour demonstration so a series of steps was demonstrated using part completed paintings but we hope to see a final painting…

2025 soon came around!  We started the year off with a near full congregation who turned out to see Mikk Murray. Mikk is an artist, living and working in Sheffield.  He describes his work as being like the symbiotic relationships within a woodland, a collection of drawings, walks, observations and explorations that work together as a whole.  His paintings emerge from this…

Mark Warner visited the society in November 2024 for the second time having previously demonstrated big brush seascape acrylic painting for us in June 2022.  The post for that demonstration can be found here. This time Mark demonstrated his Acrylic techniques for painting landscapes to good effect to another near capacity audience. Demonstrations generally happen on the first Monday of…

The 2024 November Art & Craft Fair happened on the 16th November at the Burbage Congregational Hall.  With 11 stalls on display with crafts ranging from perhaps our normal paintings, through Wood turning, Glass Fusion, Wool, Jewellery, Metal Sheet work and more plus of course the well supported Tea & Cakes! A dreary afternoon supressed some of the hoped for…

A near capacity audience once again were well entertained by Hazel Money as she produced a Pen & Watercolour Wash painting of a town scene based on her “Kit in a handbag” process and simple techniques for different pen styles! About Hazel: https://www.hazelmoney.co.uk/ Hazel has lived in Derbyshire all her life and has therefore a special connection with the landscape.…

Another good turn out from society members to witness Helen Tarr demonstrate her method for still life painting in oils, using a fairly light impressionist style of flowers in a jar.. About Helen Tarr: https://www.helentarr.art/ Helen Tarr is a professional artist, originally from Gloucestershire, currently living in the National Forest area of East Staffordshire. She specialises in alla prima oil paintings…