Dan the Man...

I was at Goldalming College in Surrey on Wednesday for a ‘Practical Painting Workshop for A Level Art- a practical guide from Cezanne to the Abstract Expressionists via Cubism’. It was a staff development opportunity that I was keen to participate in and hopefully get some new ideas for teaching painting, which despite it being my specialist field I do find a very difficult subject to teach. It was led by Daniel Fooks, the Head of Art at the College, who is an inspiration. I had previously been to a training session in 2009 led by him in London, ‘How to Get All Your Students a Grade A at A Level’, which he does every year, almost without exception. It is refreshing to hear someone who gets such amazing results say ‘I have no paperwork, just what the students make, no schemes of work, I can’t stand them’. His training day has had quite a profound impact on my approach in the classroom since, although sadly I do still have to do schemes of work despite telling my manager we don’t need them according to Dan.


It was a great day, and I did come away with lots of new ideas, but I thought I would post this to share the inspiration I came away with from Dan’s own paintings. They were in a makeshift studio space he had made in the class, and worked in alongside his students. These included this incredible set of five portraits of actor Peter Capaldi (above) that were selected for the BP Portrait Award last year. It also included a group of very large paintings based on his fascination with the forms and expressive qualities to be found in knotty trees. Although, very much derived from Cezanne’s techniques I found them really exciting. I spent my lunchtime totally absorbed by them in his studio space and having a chat with him about them. They gave me a great deal food for thought as I begin to develop my own forays into the landscape. It was a real privilege...