In the first few weeks of lockdown it became clear that many planned ‘in person’ art courses were not going to happen but with great relief I learned that Bridge House Art in Ullapool were setting up daily, then weekly, tasks for their Summer School students with a weekly coffee break on zoom. The tutors also created online versions of their week long summer courses to sign up to with contributions from invited artists. Over the last few years, like many others, my annual visit or two to BHA have become a touchstone for my painting year so the contact and community that grew out of the tasks and discussions was sustaining!

Images from a few of the wide variety of tasks the Bridge House Art team created...

As art teachers adapted to a virtual environment the abundance of online art courses grew – an opportunity to take advantage of online access to courses which otherwise have been too far away to consider, like Emily Ball’s ‘Floribunda’ and Karen Stamper’s ‘Sketchbooks’. I also continued to enjoy Paintbox Art School’s rich choice of online offerings and Lewis Noble’s growing library of video tutorials.

Images from the Emily Ball ‘Floribunda’ course…