Basingstoke Art Club providing community for members

The members gather every Wednesday to paint or draw together at The Tea Bar on London Street and they showcase their work in exhibitions throughout the year.

Anne Loughlin moved from Bognor Regis to Basingstoke last year and really appreciates the club.

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She said: “When you're new to an area, art is such a nice thing, you can always find a group of like-minded people.

“It was lovely to enjoy something like this, it made me feel a bit as if I belong.”

Every month, the Art Club votes for a theme and the members can create up to three pieces of art to be critiqued by President Jill Smith at the Orchard. This month’s theme is countries, and members can choose any artistic medium to represent a country.

Nigel is in two art clubs (Image: Jasmine Kelly) Nigel Honan moved to Basingstoke from Kent six years ago, with his partner who is originally from Hong Kong. He feels he is still getting used to Basingstoke and is in both Basingstoke Art Club and Odiham Art Group.

His painting of Poland for this month’s theme will be a gift to his neighbour, although he usually just paints over his pieces.

Nigel has been painting for 60 years but he jokes: “I’ll get good one day.”

One the left Madeline Carr's drawing of a Mauritius beach, on the right, Anne Loughlin's bulldog drawing for this month's country theme (Image: Jasmine Kelly) For this month’s theme, Madeline Carr is drawing a beach in Mauritius which she visited when her family in Australia decided to meet halfway. She is one of the club’s newer members, as she only joined in July, but she still really enjoys it.

She said: “I did art up at Cliddesden for years, so it was nice to come somewhere where I can continue it.”

Another art club member, John Lewis raved about the art club’s exhibitions, he explained that they have an annual exhibition at the Willis Museum and in April they held a show at Sherborne St John which gave the members an opportunity to sell their completed works.

He said: “It’s great fun, it’s a good group, we also do life drawing every month.”

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John Lewis with his painting of an old quay (Image: Jasmine Kelly) John always paints from photos he has taken and advises uploading the pictures onto to a laptop, as it makes the colours more luminescent.

Basingstoke Art Club meets every Wednesday 10-12pm at the Tea Bar for untutored painting time.

You can find out more details about the club here: https://basartclub.com/

Basingstoke Art Club’s latest exhibition, On the Farm, is being showcased at the Willis Museum until October 20. 

This article was written by Jasmine Kelly