About the Step by Step Art website

​and the artist behind it - Karen M Berisford

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This website was created back in 2012 as an information hub for those attending our weekly art classes, which ran in Chesterfield, Derbyshire (UK). Karen, the artist behind this website, moved up to Northumberland in 2014 and the art workshops ran two weekends a year instead. We then extended this website to provide information on a plethora of subjects, sharing our own personal art techniques and experience with different art products, as well as offering advice that we feel other artists may find useful. We continue to build upon the success of this website and hope to provide you with even more content over the coming year, so if you want to find out more about Karen and our future plans for this website, read on.

Hi, I'm Karen and I would like to tell you a little bit about myself and my artistic journey. I have always had a passion for art from a young age. I would happily spend hours with my felt pens and colouring pencils, drawing animals, but my favourite subject at that time was birds. I did not enjoy art at school, and although I always received high marks for my homework, I left school in 1990 with an 'E'. Had I received a grade lower, I would have failed my exam entirely. In 2011, a few months after I lost my mum to Bowel Cancer, I left full-time employment and became a self-employed commission artist and art tutor. In 2013 I met my partner and fellow artist John Graham. I left Chesterfield and moved to Northumberland to live with him in 2014. Working from my home studio every day and living on the coast is the perfect balance for me. It's peaceful, we have amazing scenery and an abundance of wildlife on the doorstep.
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​My art and tutoring

I work with coloured and graphite pencils as well as soft pastels and acrylic paints, but my preferences lean towards coloured pencils and acrylics, whilst still happy to provide tutorials in all these mediums.  Coloured pencils and acrylics are applied very different to each other and I find that changing mediums helps to keep my mind focused.

I began tutoring art back in 2010, when my ex-employer asked me to front a new art group. There were around 30 people all squeezed into a small boardroom, and as nervous as I was having never done it before, I came out buzzing! I left this establishment in 2011 and started a local, weekly art group later that year. These branched out to twice weekly and I also introduced 5 week workshops where those looking to create in-depth art could attend. When I met my partner and moved from my hometown, Chesterfield up to Northumberland, I was unable to continue the regular classes but wanted to carry on tutoring in Chesterfield and so brought in the 1 and 2-day art workshops which run over a weekend in May and August each year.
In 2025, I decided to cease running in-person art workshops and focus on online tutoring. 

Future plans for Step by Step Art

We began a page on the website Ko-fi.com so we could use it as our main social media page and regularly post photos and videos as well as allowing those who wanted to help support us, to donate any amount they wish. These donations go back into the business, allowing us to provide more regular content. The Ko-fi site is continuously expanding which opens up more options for our website in the future. The one we are currently focusing on is providing online video tutorials.

We will continue our art workshops, but online tutorials will be available all year round, so anyone can join up and access them as often as they wish at a fraction of the price of a workshop - it also means anyone in the world can access them too. We are currently purchasing the software and products needed to create these videos, but once we have something substantial, newsletter subscribers and visitors to this website will be informed. Click the links below to find out more about ko-fi and our own social media page.
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Find out more about our social media page

visit our ko-fi page

Advice to those new to painting and drawing

Have patience and keep an open mind. It is understandable to feel frustrated early on your journey because you may want your work to look 'perfect' from the start. Art can look 'messy' when you first begin, but what makes it work is patience and dedication. The saying 'Rome wasn't built in a day' is certainly the perfect example of this meaning. 
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Try different mediums using different papers or canvasses, you will find those that work much better for your type of art. Try different subjects too, even those that may not appeal, you may find one in particular that feels 'easier', almost as if you concentrate a little less because the subject seems to flow, this could be where your strengths lie and is a good starting point with which to improve your techniques.