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Untitled - #54320
Painting the Light
in Interiors
Discover how light transforms a room into a painting. Two step-by-step demonstrations and a deep dive into how the masters used interior light to create mood, atmosphere, and emotion.
Look at the Masters: Light in Interiors
Before you pick up a brush, we look at how the greatest painters in history used interior light — and what you can take directly into your own work.
Study Session
This session is all about one of the most fascinating subjects in painting — light inside a space. We look at how some of the greatest artists in history used light not just to illuminate a scene, but to create mood, tell a story, and guide the viewer's eye.
We explore six artists, each with a completely different approach. Caravaggio's dramatic shadows and that single, powerful light source. John Singer Sargent's loose, confident brushwork and warm theatrical glow. Sorolla's sun-drenched Mediterranean warmth.
The quiet, cool northern light of the Danish painters Peter Vilhelm Ilsted and Anna Ancher. And then Edward Hopper, whose stark, unsettling light feels like the complete opposite of comfort.
By studying how each artist handled light differently, you start to see how much it shapes the whole feeling of a painting. This session will change the way you look at light — and give you so much to take into your own work.
Caravaggio
Sargent
Sorolla
Ilsted
Anna Ancher
Edward Hopper
Watch the Study Session
→
What you'll explore in this workshop
These are the ideas and techniques that run through every part of this workshop — from the study session to both demonstrations.
Colour Temperature
How warm and cool tones work together to create the feeling of light flooding into a room — and how to use that contrast to make your paintings sing.
Window Light
Capturing diffused, directional light from a window — how it falls across surfaces, creates soft shadows, and changes everything it touches.
Loose, Confident Marks
Learning to suggest rather than describe — how to paint with freedom and let your brushwork carry the energy of the light rather than overworking the detail.
Shadow & Cast Shadows
Understanding how shadows behave in interior light — cast shadows, reflected light, and how the darkest darks make your lights glow.
Mood & Atmosphere
How the quality of light — golden, cool, dramatic, quiet — sets the entire emotional tone of a painting before a single object is even recognisable.
Colour Mixing for Light
Mixing the rich honeyed yellows, cool lilacs, and warm oranges that capture the specific quality of interior light in each demonstration.
Your two painting demonstrations
Two complete, step-by-step painting demonstrations — each one exploring a different quality of interior light. Follow along at your own pace and revisit as many times as you like.
Demonstration 1
Orange Chair
Join me as we paint this gorgeous interior full of cool, diffused window light. The whole painting is built around that contrast between the warm glow of the orange chair and the soft, cool blues of the walls and floor. We'll look at how to capture those beautiful cast shadows playing across the wall, how to suggest the geometric patterns of the window without overworking them, and how to make that orange really sing against all those cooler tones. A great exercise in temperature, contrast, and keeping your marks loose and confident.
Watch Demo 1 →
Demonstration 2
Paint Brushes
This one is a real joy to paint. It's all about that warm, golden light flooding in through the window and the way it bounces off everything around it. We'll work on capturing those rich, honeyed yellows and the cool lilac shadows side by side, how to suggest the brushes without painting every detail, and how to use loose, expressive marks to give the whole scene that feeling of warmth and light. A wonderful study in letting colour do the work.
Watch Demo 2 →