My initial notes on this were rather frustrated – “talking head, too much detail, do I need to know this?” By the end, however, I was converted and I’m prepared to say that this is one of the best introductions to acrylic painting you could wish for. At nearly two-and-a-half hours, it’s longer than many films and, yes, it does go into a lot of detail. Do you need a full explanation and demonstration of stretching paper, for instance? Well, if you’re a beginner and you’ve never done it before, yes you do, and this is one of the few films that will show you the whole process in real time. I stopped banging my head on the desk long enough to give this a big tick. One-nil to Chris.
After a fair quantity of patient introduction, it’s time to get down to painting and the main body of the film is a single demonstration of a lakeside scene that includes a distant hillside, water and trees. The hillside allows Chris to show recession, the water brings in reflections and there are two lots of trees – middle and further distance, so detailed and not-detailed. It’s a rather brilliant choice and means that the work can be demonstrated in almost real time rather than having different topics introduced in separate demonstrations that are necessarily curtailed. If you’ve ever sat in front of a film muttering “but that’s the bit I wanted to see”, well, you’ll see it. Two-nil to Chris.
Oh, and finally, I like the man. He’s a warm and generous demonstrator who gets under your skin. He’s interesting even when he’s reminding you to clean your brushes before the paint hardens and they become useless. Three-nil and a clean sweep.
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