The chair announced the results of the "best painting" vote at the Spring Exhibition and presented the trophy to the winner, Cheryl Clayton. It is planned to replace our existing website and the president asked members to submit their artwork and any other contributions of interest for inclusion.

Ann-Monique Stellinga was introduced to give her presentation, which would be devoted mainly to the introduction of texture to painting. She described how her painting style developed up to the present where most of her work incorporates textural materials. She showed us examples of her paintings, seascapes where the beach and foreshore were textured with coarse sand and seashell fragments to give them an attractive 3D appearance and landscapes where trees and other features were enhanced with dried grasses and scraps of string. Time did not permit a demonstration painting from scratch but Ann used a partially completed seascape to show her technique. As she painted she talked about her materials and answered questions from her audience. She favoured painting on a rigid ground like hardboard, mounting board or heavy watercolour paper. She was happy to use a number of different manufacturer’s acrylics on the same painting and to even incorporate acrylic inks. Almost any recycled or found material would be considered for a textural feature so long as it was stable and could be glued to her gesso ground.

Ann completed her attractive seascape to finish her presentation and leave us with a wealth of intriguing ideas.

The next meeting will be at St Luke’s Memorial Hall, Evesham Road, Headless Cross on Wednesday, July 6 at 7.30pm. when Leanne Ellis will give her presentation “Watercolour Landscape”

Supported by Redditch School of Art through Redditch Arts Council