Taking A Line For A Walk

Friday brought us out first walkshop with artist Rachel Welford, a walkshop being our term for a walking workshop. The session began with Rachel guiding us through some breathing techniques over tea and coffee, thinking about how our breathing influences the marks we make on the paper, and how using softer and lighter gradients of graphite can influence the characteristics of our drawing.

Following this we ventured out into the Garden to collect five objects within our walking distance, from there we experimented with how we interact with these objects, for example explaining the objects characteristics without looking and describing those to our drawing partners.

The session then continued with Rachel taking us for a walk down through the gardens and to the sea front, with our pencils at the beginning of the concertina sketchbooks, looking at the landscapes far and wide and drawing the outlines of the shapes and forms we see as we go…

The walkshop was in response to a Map It Well, an exhibition current situated within A Space To Be in Scarborough Art Gallery. Find out more about Map It Well here!

About The Artist

“I’m based in the beautiful seaside town of Scarborough, North Yorkshire. Originally trained in fine art (painting and printmaking), sensibilities developed during these early years are still evident within my current work. Gradually gravitating towards glass through a lifetime fascination with all things transparent, translucent and reflective, I took the plunge and committed myself to glass in 2007. In 2009 I completed a Masters Degree in Glass at the University of Sunderland, graduating with a Distinction.” – Extract from Rachel’s website.