Jackie Manning and Mary-Anne Bartlett

PAWS April – Art Safari

Mary-Anne Bartlett began her talk on April 26th by asking how many members owned a paint box.  The result showed just how many of our group have an interest in this field.  Mary-Anne started painting at her grandmothers’ knee, in Brandcaster where the landscape from the dunes, over the golf course to the salt marshes, purple with sea lavender, inspired her to travel with her paint box as a passport looking at the world through shape and colour.  She then went to Art School but had no idea how she could make a living from her art, until 1991, when she took herself off to Africa and has been in love with the continent ever since.  She set up a weekend art course in Malawi, which proved popular so she decided to set up events to enable people to paint wild animals.  Mary-Anne now lives in Woodbridge where she runs a travel company specialising in art courses in over 27 countries, including Africa.

Introductions over, Mary-Anne then proceeded to demonstrate how to draw animals. She asked members to look at a photo and describe the shape of the elephant.  The general consensus was that of a coffin, so having drawn a coffin on the paper, Mary-Anne then proceeded to turn it into an elephant complete with tusks!  The second elephant started life as a hexagon with triangles, hearts and tubes but was quickly transformed.  The third animal she drew was a giraffe, which started out as diamonds! The audience were lost in amazement at her skill as the giraffe quickly came to life under the strokes of some paint.

Her talk finished with a slide show showing animals and the paintings that were inspired by them.

All agreed that it was an excellent talk by a gifted speaker.

Next Meeting

Our next meeting is on the 24th May when Jennifer Gibbs will tell us all about “A Turkish Shirley Valentine”:

The hilarious story of how Jenny arrived in her village and began her ‘life-changing’ adventures.

Visitors are very welcome at the cost of £5.00.  Details of all our meetings and speakers can be found on the diary of the home page of the Winstred 100 website.  If you would like further information about P.A.W.S please ring either of the following committee members: Alice Holmes 01206 735510 or Jane Anderson 01206 735505