Artist demonstration by Joan Bonney

Artist Joan Bonney will be hosting an interactive art demonstration at Twisted Fish Gallery Saturday, Aug. 8. The free demo runs from 4 to 7 p.m. and people are welcome to drop in at any point. Twisted Fish will be serving wine and food during the event.

Bonney, of Traverse City, has studied art since she was 11. She was a camper at Interlochen’s National Music Camp for five summers. She and her husband Al have lived all over the world, from Lake Ozark, Missouri, to Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. Joan Bonney uses her art to help raise funds and create awareness of water-quality issues around the world. Her website, The Color of Water, explains her mission or learn more in this video.

Bonney has exhibited in many group and one-person shows with her watercolors, pencil drawings, acrylics and oils. She’s taught drawing to all ages and has painted murals from room size to 27-feet-by-14-feet.

At the Aug. 8 demonstration at Twisted Fish Gallery, Bonney hopes to use one of her own trompe l’oeil works (below) and take it from “uber-realism” to abstraction and, finally, to abstract.

“At the bottom of all this is composition,” says Bonney. “Composition is such an important aspect of artwork, I expect it to be a real challenge.”

Bonney enjoys the back-and-forth of an artist demonstration and hopes people “look over my shoulder,” talk and ask questions. She wants to provide some kind of project for guests to work on, possibly involving textures and compositions of their own. She promises it will be a lot of fun! She’ll also have some of her work for sale, such as her 2-by-2 magnetic canvasses that are worn as pins.

The free event, with wine and snacks, is from 4 to 7 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 8, at Twisted Fish Gallery, 10443 S. Bayshore Dr., one mile south of Elk Rapids. For more information, call 264-0123.