ABOUT THE CLASS

This half-day workshop is designed for those who would like to learn how to capture the beauty of mushrooms in watercolor. It is especially intended for beginners, but more experienced artists are also encouraged to attend this community paint-in. We will cover all the basics of watercolor painting, including papers, paints, basic techniques, lighting, staging your subject etc. All will paint at least one mushroom from live material during the class. Those who have paints and brushes are encouraged to bring them. We will provide paper, palettes, a limited selection of paints and brushes and other materials (pencils, erasers etc). Watercolor painting will give you new ways to view and observe mushrooms. Even those who claim that they cant draw a stick-figure will be surprised at what they can really do.

ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR

Denis Benjamin, born in South Africa, emigrated to the USA in 1970. He practiced pediatric pathology at the children’s hospital in Seattle and later at Cook Children’s in Fort Worth. He became a hiker and mushroom enthusiast, spending much of his leisure time on the eastern slopes of the Cascades. Now retired from medical practice he devotes his energy to natural history and documenting his travels, flowers and mushrooms with photography and watercolors. The latter was inspired by a workshop with the noted Russian botanical artist (Alexander - Sasha - Viazmensky). The delicate transparency and vibrancy of watercolors proved to be the ideal medium to capture the images of nature. He attended botanical illustration at the Gage Academy of Art in Seattle. He is author of Mushrooms: Poisons and Panaceas (1995, WH Freeman and Co. NY, NY) and Musings of a Mushroom Hunter: A Natural History of Foraging (2019 Tembe Press, Fort Worth, TX). He now lives in Fort Worth and is a Research Associate at the Botanical Research Institute of Texas. He is a member of the Southwestern Watercolor Society (Dallas), the American Society of Botanical Artists and a Signature member of the Society of Watercolor Artists (Fort Worth). Juried shows include Society for Watercolor Artists, Trinity Arts Guild, Fort Worth Botanical Gardens, Southwestern Watercolor Society, Irving Arts Association, CampFire TX. Painting from nature is not copying the object. It is realizing one's sensations. Paul Cezanne