The Golden Mile Art group welcome their first artist-in-residence to the Arthouse on Monday night with an introductory networking event and artist talk.
Esperance-based artist Louise Stewart-Brown will exhibit several pieces and hold workshops while based in Kalgoorlie-Boulder for the next week.
GMA chair Linda Belton said Stewart-Brown’s visit marked the launch of the group’s first residency — something the committee had wanted for some time.
“We will have the Arthouse open with her work on display for people to come and have a look and talk to her about her work,” she said.
“She will offer three workshops in three different mediums and techniques.”
Stewart-Brown told the Kalgoorlie Miner she was excited to be invited and was looking forward to sharing her knowledge with local artists.
“I am a varied artist, skilled in lots of mediums — Jack of all trades and master of none as they say,” she said.
“I work with mixed-mediums — I use paint mediums such as acrylic, watercolours and ink and I do silk painting, tile painting and fabric painting.”
The artist will offer three workshops while in town, the first of which she will teach how to draw using positive and negative space.
“Most people look at the object they are drawing and focus on that — that is the positive — but to skillfully show your subject you need to include the negative space around the object,” Stewart-Brown said.
“If you don’t know about it, this really opens another way of creating.”
The second workshop will focus on abstract painting, with each participant creating a canvas piece with acrylics and ink.
“We will complete the base on day one and day two will be enhancing the canvas with abstract creations,” Stewart-Brown said.
“People can glue something on the canvas and work around it or build it up with textures, inks and images to make it bounce off the canvas.”
The final workshop will take place at the weekend and invites participants to design an abstract pattern on either a table topper or cushion cover.
In between workshops, Stewart-Brown will be at the Arthouse at 96 Wittenoom St from 10am to 3pm each day to chat with locals and offer her advice and knowledge where she can.
Anybody interested in booking a one-on-one session with the artist can contact the art group.
A selection of Stewart-Brown’s work will also be available for purchase at the Arthouse, including prints and cards featuring her work, small watercolour originals, fabric paintings, hand-painted silk scarves and some larger pieces.
With a grant from the Shire of Esperance, the artist hired photographer Jayde Guest to take photos of her artwork so she could turn them into prints and cards so more people could purchase and display them.
Stewart-Brown said if all went well with the residency, she might return later in the year for a second run.
“Hopefully my husband and I get to see a bit of Kalgoorlie while we are there, too,” she said.
Ms Belton said the residency was hopefully the first of many.
“A big part of our vision is to create that diversity in the community and show our local artists different ways of using different mediums,” she said.
Those interested in taking a workshop can register here.