February 20^th Masato Takasaka Paint Marker Demonstration 

Masato is one of Melbourne’s most productive artists, and he seemed to really inspire people to have a go in this demo, without second guessing the result or being tentative. He’s not scared of putting his work out there, and this generous spirit helped to create a fantastic open space for people to try the materials.

One of the main  reasons Masato likes to work with markers is that he hates the distancing aspect of working with brushes. Another is that he doesn’t want to have to think about mixing colours. With these acrylic paint markers,  you can create a permanent, lightfast artwork in a really immediate and direct way. They are very opaque, while the PITT pens contain ink, so are transparent. We combined the two, playing around with how the different qualities of each affected the other.

Participants were able to use Belle Arti gesso panels, loomstate and universal primed Belle Arti Linens, Arches papers, and Heidelberg and Sydney Art Store plywood painting panels as supports. Masato actually recycles his own work a lot, either remaking it, working over the top of it, or putting it in a different context, so we actually had some paintings prepared, which people used as a starting point experimenting with the other materials.

None of the people at this demo had used these markers and pens before, but you can see from the photos how much people enjoyed them.

Julia Gorman 2014