Take one SAA artist, a village full of enthusiastic amateurs and an empty church… and – as Margaret Harvey explains - a new art group is born!

“It all started when a lovely SAA artist, Rita, came to live in our village, Malborough near Kingsbridge in Devon. She naturally wanted to make new friends. Add to that a lovely church (huge in size, small congregation, little money) and a group of people keen to explore new ideas and…. All Saints Art Club came into existence!

“Our six original members were all beginners (or had not painted for years) and we all said we couldn’t draw. Rita was a brilliant teacher. She led us through some really basic explorations with watercolours, watching paint move and mingle. We had fun, were amazed at what we could do, and gradually the group took off. We began to come up with ideas of things we wanted to try – flowers, donkeys, trees – and our watercolours expanded to include pencil, pastel, pen and wash. Most exciting of all, we could see each other begin to develop our own individual style. With gentle encouragement we have begun to overcome our “can’t draw” phobias, and our attempts to draw some of the beautiful things inside the church led to a small exhibition to show people what we had been up to on Tuesday mornings.

The group is still very new, only nine months old, but there are now 15 of us, and we are enthusiastic and very much in the spirit of the SAA. Rita has made many new friends, which she deserves to have done because she has been a real inspiration.