Holly Warner showcases watercolor community with student exhibit

For watercolor artist and instructor Holly Warner, Thursday nights at the Redlands Art Association have become a weekly ritual.

“It feels like a calm, almost unwinding of my week,” Warner said. “Even though I work on Fridays.”

Now that ritual has moved beyond the classroom walls and into the gallery. Warner has invited five students from her intermediate watercolor class to join her in a group exhibit currently on display at the Redlands Art Association, offering visitors a glimpse not only of finished work, but of the creative community that produced it.

The exhibit features artwork by Warner and her students Debra Wick, Ernesto Gomez, David Carlson, Rodger Golgart and Mona Kadah — a mix of longtime class regulars, returning artists and one first-time exhibitor.

Some of the artists have been attending Redlands Art Association classes for years, dating back to the era when Ed Sotello taught watercolor there. Wick, Gomez and Carlson all studied under Sotello before Warner took over teaching duties around 2017.

In Warner’s intermediate watercolor class, she teaches advanced and intermediate artists, but she also invites what she calls “brave beginners.”

“I encourage people to consider their own journey, not the person next to them,” Warner said.

Her program runs for five weeks, with a prompt or theme for each week. Themes include still life, landscape or architecture, people or animals, painting a poem or favorite song and creating a series of three. The final theme is chosen by the students.

She wants her students to find their own color palette, develop their own style and be creative.

“Because I always have returning students, I try to have five new topics each time,” she said. “This session, my first one I had a bruised banana that was starting to turn brown, had some speckling.”

Warner is mainly self-taught, though she previously did artifact illustrations through her archaeology degree and has also worked in architectural drafting. Today, she works in social work.

This is the second time Warner has had the chance to display her artwork alongside her students.

“I feel like the class is like my gym membership,” she said with a laugh. “I know that I am going to show up and I am going to paint. And especially the advanced artists, they say the same thing.”

She credits the Redlands Art Association for creating spaces where artists can work together.

In the last 15 minutes of her classes, students take part in a show-and-tell.

“It’s fun to see people's skills develop and their style develop,” she said. “And you get to where you recognize their work across the room. It’s really good for the beginners to hear, oh my gosh, that’s fantastic.”

The exhibit marks the second time Warner has shown her work alongside her students. It is also her first time exhibiting in several years.

“It’s been a couple of years,” she said, citing personal challenges that pulled her away from showing. She said her current pieces reflect a shift in tone — darker than her usual work, and shaped by recent experiences.

Several artists in the exhibit also challenged themselves by contributing abstract work, including Warner, Wick and Gomez.

“I find abstract — and all of us have said — it’s actually harder,” Warner said. “It makes you think in terms of essentials and there is such a focus on color. It’s a lot of brainwork.”

The six artists bring a variety of artwork, but Warner said there are common threads connecting the pieces. She noticed recurring colors, including Indian yellow and scarlet red, appearing across multiple works.

She also observed something deeper than color theory: a willingness among the artists to take emotional risks.

Warner said she often returns to a quote attributed to Pablo Picasso: “All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.”

“I find that inspiring,” she said. “It tells you to let go of preconceptions.”

The exhibit featuring Warner and her students will remain on display at the Redlands Art Association through Feb. 20.

For more information about Warner’s work, visit: www.awashgallery.com

For more information on classes and opening hours, check out Redlands Art Association’s website: www.redlands-art.org