The Holt Festival (21-27 July), now in its eleventh year, has invited Paint Out to open this year’s Festival with a two-day Paint Out and Private View (19-20 July) around the charming North Norfolk town. A day-and-a-half of outdoor painting by 25 artists should see 50+ artworks created en plein air ready for a Private View at Picturecraft Gallery on Saturday 20 July with awards announced shortly after 1pm. Saturday also sees an Art Car Boot fair featuring artists such as Colin Self running alongside from 11-5pm
Paint Out Holt – Private View Invitation
The judges are Robert Upstone, former Senior Curator of 20th Century Art at Tate and Charlotte Crawley who is a Norfolk-based Art Historian. After studying Art History at Cambridge University and The Courtauld Institute in London, she worked for five years at Windsor Castle looking after the Royal Collection of Drawings and Prints. Charlotte recently retired as the Director of the East Anglia Art Fund and serves on the Norfolk Committee of the Art Fund.
“This combination of judges has the unique qualification of having, early in their careers, curated the foremost collections of Canaletto drawings and Turner sketches probably the most famous early Plein Air painters on the planet!” – James Glennie, Holt Festival
Holt is home to 500-year-old Gresham’s School (alumni include WH Auden, Olivia Colman, Benjamin Britten, James Dyson, and the artist Ben Nicholson) and features fine 18th-century Georgian buildings and beautiful surrounding countryside.
The two-day Paint Out will be backed up by a week-long exhibition in Picturecraft of Holt, a gallery and Art material supplier with the winners exhibiting alongside the now well established Holt Art Prize.
Paint Out‘s plein air art events and exhibitions in Norfolk, UK, including Great Yarmouth, Holt, Ludham, Wells-next-the-Sea and other North Norfolk coastal towns, Norfolk Broads, seaports, market towns, country houses and gardens. We’ve stretched far and wide across the coast from Hunstanton to Wells and Mundesley down to Happisburgh, Waxham, Horsey and Winterton. Inland, we’ve explored Gooderstone Water Gardens, Gunton Park, Blickling Hall, Wolterton Park, Norwich and Whitlingham. Visit the online gallery of the events (2020, 2021,2022).
If you are a participating artist use the Logging, Location and Logistics pages for Event information and the password previously sent you (contact info@paintout.org or 07432 608015 if you have not received this).
Paint Out Norfolk, 13-22 July 2023
Our outdoor painting programme builds upon 9 years of plein air art events across of Norfolk and Norwich with an open-air exhibition that sees dozens of artwork sales. We expect to welcome over 100 artists from UK, Europe & USA, do sign up early to join the UK’s most innovative plein air art event – the July 2023 event is open for entries with over 100 artists entering via the early bird pricing (save up to £150). Come and capture the height of summer in county, city, coast and countryside locations including Norwich, Norfolk seaside, inland Broads, market towns, and historic houses, gardens and parks, allotments and cemeteries, and forays into Constable country in Suffolk!
This autumn, we are revisiting Norwich and its contrasting medieval streets and modern shops with a specific emphasis on a Nocturne painting festival running Thursday evening through to a Saturday Private View and Sunday exhibition in Cathedral Close, Tombland.
Paint Out has showcased Nocturne painting since we began in 2014. This year’s October event will be primarily focused on the plein air skill of painting as the sun disappears and evening lights appear, perhaps reflecting off damp cobbles the neon glows of shops and yellowed street lamps.
8-day tour of Norfolk saw some 75 artists attending, despite the cost of living crisis and hottest weather on record. Check out the painting locations Google map here. View the gallery of some of the finished artworks and Exhibition Catalogue. Well over 600 paintings were created and judged by: art critic and curator Hugh Pilkington, Dr Sally Anne Huxtable (National Trust Chief Curator) and artist Michael Richardson.
In June we painted 16 open gardens and a 14th-century church based in the beautiful Ludham, on the Norfolk Broads. Home to Edward Seago and Kieron Williamson, this event will also see classic cars, heritage boats, and the village life of a summer festival celebration in full swing.
This year sees two warm-up events ahead of July’s art festival and competition. In May we will paint a historic 1000-year-old church in order to help fund its preservation and also paint the sweeping views to the East Coast, lakes and arboretum belonging to James Colman nearby.
An 8-day tour of Norfolk and Norwich, coast and countryside which saw over 70 artists participate and paint from Hunstanton to Winterton, Gooderstone Water Gardens to Gunton Park, and across Norwich and the Norfolk Broads.
Judges included artists Maggi Hambling and Rob Adams, and curator/art historian Giorgia Bottinelli.
(See our 2020 Covid update for how we handled safety with a socially distant safe practice event and exhibition)
This year, Paint Out Norwich will provide a finale paintout in the Plantation Garden to the Paint Out Norfolk Gardens series which will have taken place May-October, through the year’s changing seasons, light, and colour. We are now painting Norwich Bishop’s Garden (14 Oct) as well as Plantation Garden (15 Oct) and hope to have sessions exploring other urban parks and gardens in and around Norwich.
Paint Out Holt, 19-20 July 2019
The Holt Festival (21-27 July), now in its eleventh year, has invited Paint Out to open this year’s Festival with a two-day Paint Out and Private View (19-20 July) around the charming North Norfolk town. Robert Upstone a Tate curator will be judging at Paint Out Holt.
Home to 500-year-old Gresham’s School (alumni include WH Auden, Olivia Colman, Benjamin Britten, James Dyson, and the artist Ben Nicholson), this two-session Paint Out will be backed up by a ten-day exhibition in Picturecraft of Holt, a gallery and Art material supplier with the winners exhibiting alongside the now well established Holt Art Prize.
Paint Out Norfolk takes place in conjunction with The Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts1-7 July (painting days 1st-5th, PV 5th, Exhibition 6th-7th) based around the Sainsbury Centre/UEA campus site and painting further afield including Wells-next-the-Sea, the Broads, and Houghton Hall park.
North Norfolk coast plein air painting competition. Since 2015 this event has seen workshops, demos, beach public paint outs at sunrise, Buttlands exhibition, day trips to neighbouring towns such as Blakeney, Burnham Market, Brancaster Staithe etc. Apply here or more information about our long-running Wells events.
Paint Out Great Yarmouth, 1 Sep 2018
A new one-day event is taking place – Paint Out Great Yarmouth on 1 September, from Seaside to Quayside, in collaboration with Norfolk Museums Service and particularly the Time and Tide Museum’s event ‘Drawn to the Coast: Turner, Constable, Cotman‘ which explores the identity of Great Yarmouth and its surrounding landscape through the artwork it has inspired. Apply here.
Paint Out at the RNS 28-29 June 2017
Paint Out 2017 featured a select group of invited artists painting the UK’s largest two-day agricultural fair – the Royal Norfolk Show. With up to 100,000 visitors it is the premier event of its kind.
