User:Danwillowing/sandbox

Tamara Laporte is a Dutch mixed-media artist, published author and is the founder of Willowing Arts Limited. Laporte, through her company, delivers art and wellbeing classes via the internet; beginning online distribution in the mid-2000s.

Biography
Tamara Laporte was born in Velsen, Holland in 1976. She studied art at Amsterdam University of the Arts before leaving the Netherlands for England in 1995.

Working in London in various capacities for the best part of a decade, Laporte lived in Sri Lanka with her husband Andy where she taught art, music and drama to junior school students for two years.

Upon returning to England, Laporte moved to Brighton where she began running her creative business full time in 2008, creating an online portal for users to access online video classes focussed around art and personal wellbeing.

Laporte now lives in Devon, England with her husband and two children.

She is fluent in Dutch and English.

Art Style
Laporte's work hinges on combining artistic endeavour with elements of Self-love, well-being, community, healing and Anxiety-reduction.

Her work has been be described as ‘mixed-media folk art’ with a focus on ‘magic realism’. It ranges from whimsical children’s illustrations to a more stylised fantasy art. Love, mystery, innocence, hope, spirituality, kindness and self-connection are all themes that can be found in Laporte's art work. Symbolism and layering using a wide range of materials defines the texture of her pieces. Her paintings often contain healing themes, uplifting messages and written inspirational poetry.

Typical materials utilised in her works include: watercolour paints, ink, acrylics, markers, pencils, tissue paper, canvas.

Art and wellbeing classes are delivered as video uploads via a web portal, and the primary format can be described as narration-heavy, top-down point-of-view videos, alongside tutorial-style guidance.

Writing
Laporte is a published author, beginning with ' Create Your Life Book'  in 2017. Laporte's second book, 'Ever After ', was released in late-2019. Both volumes are published by Quarry Books.

Create Your Life Book

Create Your Life Book is a 144 page book featuring project outlines alongside help for overcoming personal creative obstacles and achieving self-fulfillment. It includes projects from other creators who have also contributed to Laporte's online Life Book courses.

Ever After

Ever After is a 144 page book dedicated to step-by-step mixed-media art creations, inspired by fairy tales, folk tales and classic fiction while exploring ones own experiences to incorporate personal style into each piece. The book features contributions from other notable mixed-media artists.

Notable Work
Laporte's most recognisable export is Life Book - a year long online art course, delivered in real-time to students. Unlike most other online art classes, those contained in Life Book have a strong focus on Laporte's recurring themes; promoting well-being, self-love and other positive, affirming attitudes. The course also contains non art-based videos on wellbeing topics.