On 3 July 2010 Dennis held a Watercolour Workshop mainly for members of the Auckland Watercolour Society. The subject selected was a photograph of a local rural barn. Dennis had them brighten up the colours and also add a stream with submerged rocks instead of the paved (tar) road. Here are some of the results of the Workshop.

	The original barn
	Dennis answering a question.

Yesterday  afternoon (Saturday 8th August 2009) was the official opening of our new Torbay Studio. The weather turned out very pleasant for a winter’s day and the turn-out was excellent.

The open time was from 2pm to 6pm and  we averaged 10 visitors per hour. There was a constant and spread out stream of visitors to the studio with a total of 32 visitors throughout the 3-hour period. There was great interest in the forthcoming classes and quite a few have expressed desire of becoming students. A few have  already put their names down for starting in the next couple of days.

Although yesterday was the official opening day, classes had already been started and a very successful workshop was held last Saturday where we had  8 participants – 4 of which were complete beginners. Everyone took home a finished painting of a Venetian Scene done completely with a painting knife only.

I have  included some photographs of the afternoon and also one of a very special visitor. She came alone without her partner and stayed for about 15 minutes to keep an eye on the proceedings. You will meet her at the end of this article. She and her partner are regular visitors to our place.

Thank you to all who were able to visit the Studio.

Enjoy the photographs!

Torbay Newsletter Advert. - August 2009	Studio ready for the visitors
Display of some of Dennis' paintings	Dennis in his Studio
Showing a portrait of himself by one of his ex students	Dennis showing demo video
Anna talking to visitor	An unusual but welcome Visitor

On Saturday 1 August 2009 the Paint Basket Studio held an introductory Workshop to launch the new studio. We had 8 students who thoroughly enjoyed themselves in the use of the painting knife instead of brushes in executing a painting. I chose a Venetian scene because it needs a certain amount of dexterity in the buildings, specially the windows and the finer “detail”.

I had 4 students who had never painted before and they were highly amazed at the end of the day with their paintings. One added an article to her  Blog and you can view it HERE

All hard at work	Dennis demonstrating
Sophia concentrating	Vicki's painting in progress
KK's very first painting ever!	Also Joanne's very first painting.

We recently (26 July 2009) had an activity service where during the service there was a trampoline display and two of us were invited to  do some artwork while the service was on. The theme was “New Life”.

Brian Norton was one the right side of the  Hall while I painted on the left side. Here are a few photographs of the event. There are 2 morning services and I completed the Arum Lily during the  1st service and the Hibiscus during the 2nd  service. At the end of the service they were immediately snapped up by some of the congregation and I gave the proceeds to the Church for their  funds. The paintings are shown in a temporary frame for better viewing.

Painting during 2nd service	Brian taking a break between the services
Arum Lily - 18x24" Acrylics	Hibiscus - 18x24" Acrylics