Beyond Colour Mixing: Temperature, Light and Depth

Date: 3 Fridays, October 9th, 16th & 23rd, 2026 

Time: 6.00 PM - 8.30 PM (PDT)

Location: Online Via Zoom 

Cost: $240 for Members | $255 for Non-Members

Level: Intermediate/Advanced

All sessions will be recorded!

Workshop Overview:

This three-part lesson series builds a stronger understanding of colour through both theory and demonstration. It covers accurate colour mixing and seeing, including common relationship mistakes and aerial perspective; explores bounced and reflected colour and value transitions in form; and concludes with creating convincing colour in sunlight and shadow, with a focus on temperature. 

Lesson 1: 20 minute review of fundamentals - learn how to mix!

Seeing Colour - how to isolate to get mixtures accurate, and why we so often get colour relationships wrong in paintings. There will be a demo on aerial perspective in the landscape.

Homework: students will do colour chips at home and then photograph them and send them in.

Lesson 2: Bounced colour and reflected colour - colour and value transitions in forms, how to see them, and how to render them.

Homework: from photos provided, students will create a small still life painting,  matching precise mixtures from the reference provided.

Lesson 3: Creating colours in sunlight and shadow, getting colour temperature right. There will be a teaching segment and then a demo.

About the Instructor - Gaye Adams, SFCA:

Gaye Adams has been painting professionally and instructing painting for over 30 years. She is passionate about painting the effects of light in a representational fashion, and the challenge of creating the illusion of light and its many presentations in the landscape and elsewhere keeps her returning to the easel. In this last decade, painting en plein air has turned into a consuming passion, as it involves painting an experience, with all the senses involved, as opposed to painting a moment frozen in time by a photograph. 

She is a believer in putting first things first when it comes to teaching students to develop their painting skills, starting with a strong foundation of basics in all aspects of art making in order to give students the tools they will need to fully express themselves as they move forward in their development as painters. Gaye is an award winning painter and shows her work locally, nationally and internationally She teaches in Canada, the United States and abroad.

Student Testimonials:

• "Gaye is a fabulous teacher and mentor!  I feel extremely fortunate to have found her when I first started oils as she was instrumental in guiding me through each step of the way from beginner to recently attaining my Signature Status with the FCA.  She is one of the best:  knowledgeable, respectful, encouraging, and supportive." - Leslie Lendvoy, Vancouver, BC

• “Dedicated and talented with a wealth of experience, Gaye is truly master artist and teacher. Through her workshops, she was able to demystify plein air for me, breaking it down into very do-able steps, that I still follow. I’m no longer intimidated by getting out and painting outdoors. It was through my very fortunate opportunity to work in a mentorship with Gaye that I credit my most significant leap of improvement.” - Kate Tooke, Vernon BC