Judit Matthews
8th March 2025
On a warm, sunny early Spring afternoon 65 people turned up for the very interesting demonstration by artist illustrator Judit Matthews. She works mainly in pen and ink, watercolour and collage and gave us examples of each of these in her demo.
She had sketched her composition of the ladies waiting for their swimming lesson in pencil first, and then demonstrated how she inks over the outline with a dip pen and black waterproof ink. She likes to use Bristol Board, which is smooth and white and 'perfect for illustration'. She said hot pressed watercolour paper is best but is more expensive. Judit said 'don't cry' if the pen makes a splodge - you can use a white Posca pen to cover it, use a piece of collage or turn it into a bird! After the ink is dry, she rubs out the pencil marks before adding watercolour.
Judit told us a bit about her background, how she started painting and her career which includes illustrating children's books. She said she likes all her paintings to have a 'story'. She moved on to a second illustration of a country landscape to demonstrate her painting technique, starting with flat washes and then building up depth with dotted stippling made with the tip of the brush, and some graded washes, adding more pigment and smaller marks with each layer. She often finishes with some splattering for fun. She said it can take 6 to 7 hours to build up the layers.
The final technique that Judit demonstrated was an intricate and precise method of collaging. She added pieces of collage to a painting of koi carp in a pond, to give it more detail and interest. She traced the section on the painting she wanted to collage; placed the tracing over the collage paper and then cut out both with a scalpel knife; she very carefully then pasted the piece of collage in place with PVA. Below you can see details of a collaged rock, alongside the whole painting. She also showed us more bathing beauties with collaged swim-suits, waiting for the watercolour to be added!
