Have you ever done one of those “Wine and Canvas” events? Terri and I (and another couple) experienced it for the first time Saturday afternoon and came home with two masterpieces — well, not really masterpieces. More like wall hangings.

 

The Paint Nite event was held at the Prairie Tap House in Eden Prairie. The other couple we painted with were Debbie and Dean Johnson. Debbie is a co-worker of Terri’s at Kraus-Anderson.

 

We met early for lunch at the Taphouse and watched a little of the Gopher football game. The food was fantastic and it was nice getting to know new people.

 

While we ate, Artist Jeremy Bancroft set up the room in the back with dozens of canvasses, easels, paints and brushes. The painting we were assigned to “copy” was one of his originals entitles, “Autumn at the Dock.”

 

Twenty-four blank canvasses greeted the would-be artists as the event began at 1 p.m. We all donned our bibs and selected a spot best-suited for the well-lit room.

 

The subject of the painting didn’t seem to daunting to me. A sky, some trees, some water and a dock. Should be easy, right?

 

Our instructor, Jeremy, was flamboyant and had a laugh that had a little Austin Powers feel to it. He continually encouraged us to not take things too seriously and to perpetually smile.

 

We were all a little amazed that we were expected to paint the elements of the painting with just five colors on our paper plates. Red, yellow, blue, white and black was all we had to choose from. But Jeremy reassured us we’d have all we needed to reproduce the featured artwork.

 

All the while we are putting paint to canvas, we had a waiter troll the room to serve drinks. Some people just drank water, some had hard drinks and some had wine or beer. The more serious artists had the water.

 

The only difficulty most of us had was the speed at which the teacher taught, though most quickly caught on. Jeremy had the room for only so long, so he moved through the steps vigorously.

 

I even think he may have skipped a few steps, just to get the class done on time, but that didn’t bother most of us.

 

Overall, the experience was awesome. It felt good to get a paint brush back in my hands and do a little art again. Terri loved it and Debbie and Dean were all smiles afterwards.

 

If you haven’t had the pleasure of experiencing one of these events, I highly recommend it. Even if you have no artistic talent, you can still just have fun with it and even enjoy a few cocktails.

 

Then when you get home, you can hang your masterpiece.

Or your wall hanging.