Have you ever been to one of those Sip and Paint evenings where are you get to have fun painting in a group? Being an artist, I never thought I would go to one of those, but now it turns out I'm running one!
Here's how that happened, what I learned and how I became a rockstar along the way. Get a cup of tea and strap in.
This year I spent four months travelling around New Zealand in a campervan, exploring this beautiful country. I guess I spoke to a few people every day but I didn't really have any community around me, and it wasn't until that happened that I realised what I was missing.
I returned home with a burning desire to get in touch with the small rural community that I had just moved into. The little town of Waipu. Population about 1400. I wondered what I could give to the community. And what do you know, I'm a painter and teacher so I thought of doing some painting workshops, which I've done plenty of before.
It occurred to me that if I wanted to teach my normal more serious painting workshops then I would really be limiting the number of people who would want to come along. So the idea of a sip and paint popped into my head, and immediately I thought, oh that could be fun!
Rather than question the impulse I just dove straight in, bought a bunch of easels and supplies, found a gallery space in town where I could host it, and got to work designing my first lesson.
"Langs Beach" - my first lesson.
I really didn't want to show up underprepared, so I kind of overprepared. I painted a few trials first, figuring out the simplest designs and methods, knowing the students would be absolute beginners. I made these printouts for each student so that they could refer to them while painting, and tested the first class with just one person - my girlfriend, Pamela. (Thanks Pamela).
That was really helpful in pointing out the holes in my teaching, and so I went into my first class with 7 family members with more confidence.
My happy band of guinea pigs had a great time and produced beautiful paintings.
That was also a great learning experience for me. When you are teaching something and 7 people get it wrong, you can instantly see where you made a mistake as a teacher. Priceless! So, I was ready for my first real class.
The first real class, with no family involved, was a roaring success!
By this time, I'd refined the setup, the music, the lighting, the heating, some of the snappy patter and Dad jokes to the point where it was running surprisingly smoothly, my stress levels had dropped nearly to zero, and I was having fun along with everyone else.
Here's what I discovered...
There's something really special and different about teaching this sort of class. For one, as an artist who's taught a lot of painters, it takes the pressure off me, knowing that the bar is set so low in terms of their painting expectations. Many of these people have never even touched paints before! (Hard to imagine!).
Secondly, we're ALL there to have a good time first, the painting is really secondary. It's the other way around in a normal painting class. That makes it SO much fun. It's a lesson that teaches FUN! 
Of course, that's going to vary from person to person - some people really are there to upskill their painting, and some people are harder on themselves than others. Also, I walk the fine line between having fun myself, and presenting good instructions.
Thirdly, and not last, and not least, I get to go out on a friday night and have fun with a bunch of locals! YAY!! When the alternative is going to a pub and watching loud drunk people get louder and dummer, (Oh God please, no!), it's just so nice to have a regular-ish fun group outing. So good!
Welll, not exactly a rockstar. You'll see...
So, with lots of fun classes done I had accumulated quite a decent pile of demo paintings that I thought I could either paint white over, burn, give away to students, or I could enhance them with oils and put them up for sale. My dad suggested an online auction.
So I turned this acrylics demo painting...
Into this upgraded painting with oils...
Like this...
I liked the idea of an online auction as another fun event for the locals to be involved in, and to spread word of the painting classes. I could've listed it on trademe, the New Zealand eBay equivalent, but I've been learning how to use AI to build websites and I had already built one for the Sip Laugh Paint events, so I just built my own auction page using AI. (I use an Ai no-code web building platform called Replit) It's Oh so clever.
Having done that, and also having just started to make some songs using Ai (Suno.com), I thought, wouldn't it be nice to make a song about the painting and our local area, and about the auction, altogether. Hmmm.
THEN, this thought struck me from out of the blue. Wouldn't it be cool to make a rock video of me singing that song!? I laughed very hard, and I took that as a good sign to go ahead.
THEN, another thought struck me from out of the blue, just as I was wiping the tears from my eyes from the first thought. 'Wouldn't it be cool to have a rock guitar that had a painting in it!?
THEN I could ROCK OUT with my PaintShredder guitar in the rock video!' OOOH YEAH! Again, laughed so hard I cried, and so, who was I to stand in the way of such an epic idea, clearly handed down to me my God himself.
So I got to work building the Guitar and used Ai to help me write the song (which is awesome!), asked Pamela to help film me being an idiot at the local beach, then charged my drone up...
And hey presto, wiggle ya paintbrush, I'm a rockstar! 
What I learned...
1. Creativity can flow anywhere it wants.
2. Being a Rockstar is silly, but fun.
3. I like fun.
4. I obviously have waaay too much time on my hands.
Anyway, I premiered the video at my 50th birthday party a few days ago and, as hoped, everyone had a great belly laugh at my expense. I hope you did too.
And... if you do happen to want to get your hands on that painting, pop over to the auction page!: https://siplaughpaint.com/auction
All the best for your next creative splurge, whatever that may be!
Richard Robinson.
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