1) What kind of classes do you teach?
I teach watercolour and sketching to artists aged 6-15.
For my classes, we will have drawings that spark students' imaginations, and we will learn skills and tricks along the way! Watercolour has been my joy since elementary school. I love how fast you can draw and how whimsical it can be. So be you, and just go for it! Sometimes a happy accident happens and you get to discover a new way to create!
2) Your professional background
I grew up in three different countries, China, Japan, and Canada. I have a Bachelor's degree in Illustration from Sheridan College. I am a big fan of kids' art! They're full of unknown wonders!
Before I started teaching I was working as a freelance Illustrator & Animator, and had a restaurant called "Liu Liu Hot Pot" in Downtown Hamilton Ontario! I think having a variety of skills outside art is what made me stronger & interesting as an artist.
3) The values or philosophy behind your teaching
I have been teaching watercolour and sketching for almost a year. The attraction of creating something for me is to practice paying attention to details, communicate in different media, not be afraid to take in new challenges, and help us get to know a bit more about ourselves!
Hope we can discover and draw your curiosities together in class!
4) Something fun and personal!
In my day-to-day life, I try to eat food with a lot of colours and do yoga with my grey cat.
What We Will Learn:
- Doing a mini-experiment first before diving into our final project
- A balance between water and paint to create a lighter and darker value
- Test colours on the paper first
- 3D space, room in a cube
- Wet-on-wet
- Reflection
- Shadow
- Gradient with colour
- Foreground, mid-ground, background
- Vary in size to create an illusion of depth and space
- Paint rough first and do detail later
- Paint a light colour first, and gradually paint a darker colour
- Define the bright colour with black background
- Symmetry
- Limit to the complementary colours
- Limited colours to practice more with value
- 1 brush 2 colours
- Layering colours, mixing colours on the paper
- Face expressions
- Make folding cards
- Use patterns to simplify object and animal textures
- Balance placement, and random placement
- Add white to colours to create opaque paint, use it for a foreground
- Leave white space on paper for outlines
- Negative painting
- Using curves and lines to paint a negative space
- Painting from pictures
- Divide and combine 3 worlds together
- Painting food, decorate your salad bowl
- Draw yourself into our story
- Use an element of our subject to frame the pictures
- Draw animals with human characteristics
- Brush techniques:
1. Pressure lightly to create a small line and a small dab
2. Press hard to create a thicker line and a bigger dab
3. Use a dry brush for hair and grass-like textures
4. Using fast and slow brush movements for different looking ends
5. Use Flatbush for both thin and thick lines
6. Push, pause, and repeat for a wooden stick like lines
Email to BOOK CLASS!
*all materials are included
Thank you so much! happy to chat with you soon :)