Category Archives: Uncategorized

June 14, 2025 Meeting

June 14, 2025 Meeting
Jim Brooksher will be our featured artist.

“In my work, I transform actual places into “romantic settings”. My primary goal in painting is to capture the beauty of memorable places and inspire the viewers to visit the depicted locations. I make my works romantic and representational without looking too realistic or illustrative. My works often bring back a memory viewers can connect with. A noted trademark of my works is the use of accentuated color. Brilliant colors aid in capturing the viewer’s eye, and help in making scenes more romantic.

I started drawing everything I saw when I was seven. My mom, seeing that I loved art, bought me an adult oil painting set, complete with harsh paint thinners. I started painting mostly animals, then area landscapes.

My high school did not offer art classes (metal shop and wood shop were the closest things to art classes). I convinced my parents to help me do the mail-in classes offered by Art Instruction Schools (as advertised on TV), in Minneapolis, Minnesota. This exposed me to various media, including charcoal sketching, acrylics, pastels, ink drawing and even ceramics.

My high school did not offer art classes (metal shop and wood shop were the closest things to art classes). I convinced my parents to help me do the mail-in classes offered by Art Instruction Schools (as advertised on TV), in Minneapolis, Minnesota. This exposed me to various media, including charcoal sketching, acrylics, pastels, ink drawing and even ceramics.

I had several jobs after college, including design engineer, quality technician, and eventually an engineering manager at a Lake County Illinois pharmaceutical company. I still considered art as my primary focus. I started participating in summer art fairs to show my paintings, and now focus on watercolor paintings and oil paintings as my career. I turned an art hobby into a “side career” and eventually into a full-time business. I also do art demonstrations for schools and art leagues. I have participated in over 300 art fairs.

All of my landscape works represent actual locations. The descriptions on the front of my paintings tell about the depicted scenes and they often give directions on how to visit the painted sights. I sometimes start painting on location to aid in capturing a specific mood. I then finish the paintings in my studio.

My paintings of Midwest barns, lighthouses, Chicago scenes and mountainscapes are either done from multiple photos and/or from initial draft paintings started on location.”

April 5, 2025 Meeting

April 5, 2025 Meeting

Venarella Hinkle will be our guest demo artist.

Venarella first studied the medium of Watercolor under a local Watercolorist who used the medium for 30 plus years. She put her paint brush miles in weekly classes for 2 years and fell in love with the flow of water and pigment. Since then she has continued her education in this wonderful medium under well know Artists and has worked hard to develop her own style and skills. She has been featured in the McHenry County Magazine as Artist Showcase in 2013. Received highest auction bid at Rockford IL Anderson Gardens Captured on Canvas Plein Air Event in 2015, and has won first place in Beeblys Watercolor Painting November contest challenge in 2023. Venarella taught in person classes at Cherry Lane Farm in her home town for 2 years, and online via Zoom for 2 years during the pandemic years. I learned what it means to paint what you love. She now specializes in Pet Portraiture and in teaching others the amazing effects you can achieve with the beauty and transparency of Watercolor.

you can register here: https://oak-brook.libcal.com/event/14026672

November 2024 Meeting

November 2024 Meeting

Maria Delton Guest Demo Artist.

Thank you Maria Delton for your wonderful demo at the IWS November 2024 meeting. Everyone truly enjoyed hearing about your career experiences in Italy and your many valuable lessons and tips in watercolor. Fun time for all.

Maria Delton. Guest artist at the IWS November demo meeting.

June 1 Demo Meeting

June 1 Demo Meeting

You must PREREGISTER online at Oak Brook Library website. Limited to 100. Click link to register.

https://oak-brook.libcal.com/event/11424223

Tony Armendariz is an award-winning contemporary realist artist living and painting in Palatine, Illinois. His work focuses on figurative subjects rendered in watercolor. Graduating from the American Academy of Art in Chicago, he studied under renowned watercolor instructor Irving Shapiro. He has won numerous awards in regional and national competitions and has exhibited his work in many group and solo exhibitions.

Tony is a signature member of many national artistic societies including the American Watercolor Society, the Transparent Watercolor Society of America and the Illinois Watercolor Society where he also served as director. He is represented by Hilliard Gallery in Kansas City, Missouri.

Tony Armendariz Artist Demo—Saturday June 1, 2024, 2pm

Open and FREE to the public. Oak Brook Public Library, 600 Oak Brook Road
You must PREREGISTER at library website. Limited to 100.

Watercolor April 6 Demo & Meeting

Watercolor April 6 Demo & Meeting

In-person and FREE to the public.
Oak Brook Public Library, 600 Oak Brook Rd

You must PREREGISTER online at Oak Brook Library website.
Limited to 100. Click link to register.

https://oak-brook.libcal.com/event/11424203

John Herron Artist Demo—Saturday April 6, 2024, 2pm
Open and FREE to the public. Oak Brook Public Library,
600 Oak Brook Road
You must PREREGISTER at library website. Limited to 100.

Bruce A Neville Live Demo Aug 5th

Bruce A Neville Live Demo Aug 5th

Illinois Watercolor Society Live, in-person Demo
Bruce Neville Artist Demo—Saturday August 5th, 2023, 2pm.

In-person and FREE to the public.
Oak Brook Public Library, 600 Oak Brook Rd
You must PREREGISTER online at Oak Brook Library website.
Limited to 100. Click link.

https://oak-brook.libcal.com/event/9804804

Bruce Allan Neville is a signature member of the Ohio Watercolor Society, an Associate member of the American Watercolor Society, and a Signature member of the Cincinnati Art Club. Neville has won numerous awards and honors. He also has extensive teaching and workshop experience throughout the Midwest. 

Neville’s style and technique were published in the “The Watercolor Technique of 23 International Artist”. My goal is to develop not a style of painting but a way of thinking, interpreting, and being creative. Each painting conveys a unique experience leading the viewer into a new way of seeing and understanding”.

Bruce Neville Artist Demo—Saturday August 5th, 2023, 2pm
Open and FREE to the public.

Oak Brook Public Library, 600 Oak Brook Road
You must PREREGISTER at library website. Limited to 100.

Watercolor Demo & Meeting

Watercolor Demo & Meeting

Thomas Trausch Artist Demo—Saturday June 3, 2023, 2pm.
Open and FREE to the public.

Oak Brook Public Library, 600 Oak Brook Rd
You must PREREGISTER online at Oak Brook Library website.
Limited to 100. Click link.

https://oak-brook.libcal.com/event/9804794

“I have been extremely fortunate to be able to follow my dream of being a ‘fine artist’ and I thank God for this. My years as an artist have been about equally divided between the mediums of watercolor and oils, each with its own properties and end results. Always a challenge, making art allows one to explore more deeply and inevitably find out more about the maker, the artist. The process of painting is what the journey is all about … the resultant paintings are the mile markers along this wonderful road of discovery. It is and always will be … a thrill.”.

Thomas Trausch Artist Demo—Saturday June 3rd, 2023, 2pm

Open and FREE to the public.
Oak Brook Public Library, 600 Oak Brook Road

You must PREREGISTER at library website. Limited to 100.