James Toogood, a master watercolourist and teacher is offering workshops to art enthusiasts at Masterworks Museum this week.If you’re having trouble learning to paint don’t despair, even master painters like Mr Toogood can become intimated by certain subjects.The American first visited Bermuda 30 years ago. He had a look at our seaside rocks and sparkling ocean, and decided to paint something more urban.“Then I started to realise that the coastal rocks was just a matter of surface texture,” he said. “Then I began to embrace doing the water and the rocks. I have really grown to love painting all the natural beauty of Bermuda.”He’s continued to visit the Island and paint ever since.He is known for his ability to create realistic light and texture in his work. Some of his paintings of Bermuda, on display at Masterworks in the James Toogood exhibition, are so lifelike they appear as photographs.“I have always been attracted to different qualities of light — whether it is the sparkling gold sunshine of Bermuda or the soft silver light of the United Kingdom,” said Mr Toogood.His work has appeared in over 30 exhibitions in the United States. He teaches at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the National Academy of Design in New York City and the Perkins Centre for the Arts in New Jersey.“There are things about watercolour that are challenging,” said Mr Toogood. “There are things that you have to be able to wrap your head around. Once you come to terms with it then you are fine. I teach now at the school where I studied, the Pennsylvania Academy. It is primarily an oil painting school.”He said when he was a student he did experience some snobbery about watercolours.“They said ‘we follow the method [of oil painting] established by American artist Thomas Eakins’. I said ‘yes, but Thomas Eakins was one heck of a watercolourist’.“They had to concede that. Once I finished the two years’ required courses at the academy in oils, I just went back to watercolours. I did have one instructor who got very cross about that and wouldn’t talk to me for about six months, but we got it settled. Most of the other instructors were very supportive.”Mr Toogood said oil paints and watercolours differ in the way light in the painting is achieved. With oil painting you can use white paint to achieve your whites, but with watercolour, to maintain your sparkle, you are using the white paper.“What happens is that light penetrates the paper and bounces back out again,” said Mr Toogood. “I found ways to manipulate the paint to create more effects.“The pigments stay the same with any medium, it is only the vehicle that changes. It is gum Arabic and some type of sugar water and glycerine in watercolours. If you know how to make the pigment work in oils then you can do watercolours.”His workshops will be geared towards all levels from beginners to more experienced painters.“I am going to be making sure that people get enough attention that they should have a good experience,” he said. “Before hand, there will be an orientation and I will discuss materials.“The second day I will talk about materials again and I will talk about the nature of pigments. I will be giving a demonstration, because I think that is really helpful so people can really see what I am talking about.”Students in the workshop are asked to bring their own source material, such as photos of what they want to paint.“For people who are just beginning, hopefully they are going to fall in love with watercolour the way I have,” he said.Workshops run for the next two weekends. The cost is $160 per weekend workshop for a member, and $180 for a non-member.To book call 299-4000 or visit www.bermudamasterworks.com under education/adult workshops.