Spring Landscapes in Gouache

A one-day workshop with artist Nicky Bell exploring illustrative gouache painting of spring landscapes in the style of bold, flat-colour art.

This intensive one-day workshop introduces gouache, a water-based paint medium prized for its matte, velvet-like finish and its ability to layer light over dark. Participants move away from traditional realism towards a bold, illustrative landscape style inspired by artists such as David Hockney, celebrating spring on the South Downs. The session covers deconstructing landscapes into layers, sketching simplified graphic line drawings from reference photos, achieving the right water-to-paint ratio, building a personal colour palette, and techniques for sharp edges and fine-line detail, before completing a landscape study on high-quality paper. All primary materials are provided, and attendees may bring their own reference photos of local landscapes and wildflowers.