Falmouth’s ‘Wicked Witch of Watercolours’ is back

There’s a particular moment every new watercolour student seems to reach, somewhere in that first hour with a loaded brush and a blank sheet of paper. It’s the moment they realise nobody is going to tell them off for going outside the lines, because this time there are no lines. From September, a fresh batch of beginners in Falmouth are about to find that out for themselves.

No stinky paints, no filthy fingers

📷Credit: Fiona-Loveday Pruden

Fiona-Loveday Pruden has heard the same reaction from new students often enough that she can practically predict it. They arrive expecting something closer to a school art lesson: solvents that take days to dry, paint under the fingernails, careful colouring-in. What they get instead is just water and colour, and the discovery, most of them say, is that it’s nothing like they expected.

Fiona is known to her students as the Wicked Witch of Watercolours, a name she picked up teaching in Welwyn, Hertfordshire, before returning to her childhood roots in Cornwall. With more than 20 years behind the easel, she has built her classes around a simple starting point: a palette of just three primary colours, and the time to properly understand what they do. Students learn to mix and blend, get to grips with tonal values, and build up drawing skills alongside the painting itself.

That depth of knowledge comes from more than two decades of teaching, but also from time spent with the people who make the materials. Fiona has worked with Winsor & Newton on how paint is made, with St Cuthberts Mill on paper, with Derwent on pencils, and with one of the very few hand-made brushmakers left in the UK. “It makes me laugh when people say that watercolours is ‘so unforgiving’ and ‘the hardest medium for painting’,” she says. “Welcome to the wicked world of watercolours, where I just put the work under the tap and wash off what went wrong the first time. It’s just paint and water, what can possibly go wrong?”

Three ways in this autumn

The new term opens with two options. Classes start on Saturday 5th September, 10.00am to 12.30pm, at the Princess Pavilion, or on Monday 7th September, 1.00pm to 3.30pm, at Pendennis Community Hub. Both work through a programme of classes across the term, building skills, knowledge and understanding, and the confidence to just have a go and see what happens.

Every class comes with its own Prep Sheet, setting out what will be painted, why, the materials and approaches needed, and the tips and tricks to get to a finished painting worth showing off. Along the way, students pick up something close to an entire glossary of new terms and phrases too. “One of these days, I’ll publish these in a book,” Fiona laughs.

A brand new Wednesday session

This autumn also brings something entirely new: Wednesday Watercolour Workouts, launching weekly at Fairwinds Community Hub, tucked below KCM Church in the centre of Falmouth’s Market Street. It’s less a class and more an artists’ community, open to anyone from across Cornwall rather than just locals.

Two sessions run each Wednesday, and the format stretches well beyond painting alone. There’s space to work on your own piece, experiment alongside others, watch or give demonstrations, and pick up the practical side of being an artist too, from framing and presentation to photographing work for Instagram and Facebook. Finished paintings will also go on show, for others to view, enjoy and buy.

Whether the aim is a first nervous wash or a nudge back into practice after years away, Fiona reckons there’s a place in one of the groups for it. “Every day’s a school day,” she says, “and there’s so much to enjoy, getting wicked with watercolours.”

Anyone wanting to find out more can contact Fiona-Loveday Pruden on 07956 537140 or by email at [email protected].