WITH LUCY MacGILLIS

FIVE MEETINGS

Fridays

January 10

January 17

January 24

January 31

February 7

2025

11 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. Eastern time

In this online class, we'll focus on the masterpieces of four female Italian painters, investigating what it is about them that is timelessly captivating. Using the method of transcription, we will draw from these paintings without copying them, but searching for the brilliant uses of rhythm, duality and repetition within the geometry of these compositions. In each session we will explore a specific painting at length in a group discussion over zoom. After the introduction to each painting, participants will have a week to prepare a drawing transcription, as well as a chromatic study created with oil paints, to better grasp the use of color in that day's masterpiece. MacGillis will present demos from her studio in Italy to show how she goes about mixing the colors in the paintings using a limited earth palette and palette knife.

Each participant will receive a kit in the mail, prior to the course, containing the prints of the five paintings we will transcribe as well as paper measured in proportion to the works. Primed Fabriano paper will also be provided for the color painting studies.

WITH LUCY MacGILLIS

FIVE MEETINGS

Mondays

February 24

March 3

March 10

March 17

March 24

2025

11 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. Eastern time

ONLINE WORKSHOP. In transcribing we study from paintings, rather than simply copy them. Investigating what it is about masterpiece compositions that makes them timeless helps us push our own painting further. In this intensive five-week online course, we will explore the great art of Sicily. We will study the Roman mosaics of Piazza Armerina, into the renaissance with Antonello da Messina, and the Baroque masterpieces by Caravaggio, as well as modern Sicilian artists. We will transcribe from a selection of masterpieces and discuss our work each week. Prints of the paintings, and Fabriano drawing and painting paper will be mailed to participants prior to the class. Meetings will be held on Zoom and work will be shared on Padlet, the online platform.

WITH JENNIFER MOSES

FIVE MEETINGS

Tuesdays

March 11

March 18

March 25

April 1

April 8

2025

11 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. eastern time



“Drawing is the artist's most direct and spontaneous expression, a species of writing; it reveals, better than does painting, the true personality.”— Edgar Degas

ONLINE WORKSHOP

Drawing is the language of ideas.

In this workshop we will use drawing as a means to find and develop an idea and translate these preliminary works into one or more paintings. Over the span of the workshop, using both drawing and painting materials, you will sketch and sketch and sketch some more! It is in the sketch that your ideas will be born. We will begin with sketchbook prompts, touching on different art idioms: observation, abstraction, and imagination. In addition, you will create some developed drawings that will form the basis of a final painting.

Through presentations, critique, and guided assignments we will develop our analytical thinking about the union of form and content necessary to give a visual voice to an idea.

Meetings will be held on Zoom and work will be shared on Padlet, an online platform.

Portraits from Observed to Imagined 



WITH ELIZABETH REAGH



TUESDAYS

April 15

April 22

April 29

May 6

May 13

2025

1 - 4:30 p.m. eastern time

A five-week ONLINE portrait-painting workshop in which quick observational sketches will be the starting point for portrait paintings. The beauty of the 2 - 5 minute drawing is that the artist is forced to make quick decisions — resulting in an expressive record of the essence of the sitter and a window into the artist’s response. The drawings provide just enough information to apply to a painting, without allowing for copying — translation is the name of the game here.  

We will explore the use of color, composition, imagination and intuition in creating characters who may or may not resemble the original sketch. This class will rely entirely on direct observation and imagination. 

WITH RICK FOX

May 16, 17, and 18, 2025

10 a.m.-4 p.m.

IN PERSON AT BLACK POND

Working from observation, we will spend three days translating the head through various exercises using pencil, charcoal, sculpture, and paint. This workshop will emphasize understanding the head through perception and the physicality of the mediums. Spontaneous invention will be encouraged.

Price includes lunches and model.

WITH NANCY McCARTHY

May 29-June 1, 2025

Thursday-Sunday

10 a.m. - 4 p.m. eastern time

IN PERSON AT BLACK POND

The striking contrasts of black and white, and the subtle differences between grays, will fuel our images. First, using brushes with black ink on white paper, we will build compositions from shapes of black and white, with still life and the landscape as our sources. We will move into ink washes, then switch to white on black, and each day delve into more exercises using pens, cut paper, collage, and block prints. Our aim is to generate a volume of drawings, from both observation and abstraction, which expand our visual vocabulary, sensitivity to value and shape, as well as compositional skills. We will view image presentations, and discuss work. Image presentations and discussions will deepen our work. Price includes lunches.

WITH ROTEM AMIZUR

THIS WORKSHOP IS FULL

October 25-28, 2024

Friday-Monday

10 a.m.-4 p.m. eastern time

IN-PERSON WORKSHOP AT BLACK POND. Collage gives one the opportunity to paint without fear. It turns looking and composing into a playful game, where shapes of color are easily cut and moved. We will start by painting paper; participants will create their own color palette. Throughout the workshop we will investigate color families, rhyming shapes, and echoes in painting.

We will focus on the connection between the model and her surroundings, first through art history and then through looking and experiencing life in front of us. When painting something alive like the model, suddenly the wall, the chair, the flowers, everything around her becomes alive and part of the composition. By prioritizing that connection, and applying observation and invention, surprising harmonies will occur.

WITH NANCY McCARTHY



THIS WORKSHOP IS FULL



Sept 10-Dec 17, 2024

Eight meetings

Tuesdays 6:00 -9:30 p.m.

eastern time

September 10 and 24

October 8 and 22

November 5 and 19

December 3 and 17

2024

There are 3 main objectives in this ONLINE class:

• To identify aspects of your work that are distinct and personal, and to explore ways of developing and fortifying those aspects.

• To determine areas of your work that are weak and/or diminish your work and (using a variety of exercises), work to improve those areas.  

• To establish a consistent, disciplined painting practice.

The goal of creating more personal and powerful paintings will be addressed by considering the following issues: content, composition/format, color, surface as well as materials and craft. We will explore the aspects of painting that interest each student most, including experimentation with materials and conceptual and technical approaches to painting or more traditional work from observation. Classes consist of discussion, image presentations and critique. Each student will develop a set of written goals as well as a painting schedule. Students must be present and are encouraged to participate in all discussion and critiques. Students will post new work, preliminary drawings, and work in progress on the Padlet each week for discussion. Additionally, students are required to research and identify their relatives, 3 artists whose work shares common elements with their own work or the work they aspire to do.

Those who want more structure and/or direction will be given assignments tailored to their particular needs. Group discussion of student work along with looking at contemporary and historical painting will enhance the class.

Meetings will be held on Zoom and work will be shared on Padlet, the online platform.

WITH SUSAN LICHTMAN

AND ROBIN FEUER MILLER



THIS WORKSHOP IS FULL

Seven meetings

Tuesdays

10:30 a.m-2 p.m. eastern time

September 17

September 24

October 1

October 8

October 15

October 22

October 29

2024

ONLINE WORKSHOP. This interdisciplinary, team-taught workshop will bring together the practice of studio art and the study of Russian literature. Working in a range of media (drawing, painting, and digital), participants will use Russian fiction (and some critical theory) as source material for the creation of visual images. Readings will include short texts of Gogol, Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Chekhov, Babel, and Nabokov.

Meetings will be held on Zoom and work will be shared on the Padlet platform.

Lectures by Robin Feuer Miller will introduce the readings, and visual exercises will be presented by Susan Lichtman. Both instructors will review the work with the group in live, interactive meetings. Participants should have basic drawing and painting experience.

Robin Feuer Miller, Edytha Macy Gross Professor of Humanities and Professor of Russian and Comparative Literature at Brandeis University.

Susan Lichtman, Painter, Professor of Fine Arts, Brandeis University

Image: Anna Karenina by Susan Lichtman

Exploring the world through drawing, sculpture, printmaking and collage



WITH NANCY GRUSKIN AND MAUREEN NATHAN



THIS WORKSHOP IS FULL



Five meetings

WEDNESDAYS

September 11 through October 9, 2024

11 a.m.-2 p.m. eastern time



ONLINE: Much can be learned from working across media and exploring one theme through 2D and 3D processes. Prior to the start of this online workshop, participants will select a subject to serve as the springboard for their drawings, sculptures, prints, and collages. This subject could be a group of objects, a personal photograph, the view from the artist’s window, a work of art produced by another artist, or an intangible idea. Maureen Nathan will encourage participants to develop and explore their chosen subjects through a variety of drawing exercises that aim to expand the artists’ alphabet of marks with an emphasis on context. Nancy Gruskin will then shift the focus from 2D to 3D, inviting students to interpret their drawings as sculptures constructed of common household materials. In week three, these sculptures will serve as subject matter for prints. Nathan will introduce both intaglio and relief printmaking using recycled materials with water-based inks. In our fourth meeting, participants will explore paper cut-outs and the medium of collage with Gruskin, using their prints from week three as points of departure. Our fifth class will give participants the opportunity to talk about their work, as we consider final thoughts on the conversation between drawing, sculpture, printmaking, and collage.

Nathan and Gruskin will be participants in this workshop, as well as instructors, with the aim of facilitating exciting and unexpected outcomes. We will use Zoom to meet as a group and all work will be shared on Padlet. Slide presentations and demos will supplement both instructors’ exercises. A small craft press is useful, but not necessary, for the printmaking exercises.

WITH CATHERINE KEHOE

THIS WORKSHOP IS FULL

Five Meetings

Thursdays

October 3

October 10

October 17

October 24

October 31

2024

1-4:30 p.m. eastern time

ONLINE WORKSHOP. Photos of ancestors — those we have known in life and those we can know only from the images — will be the sources for this workshop. These photos might trigger a narrative, imaginary or real. We might begin with an impulse for detail and description, a desire to imagine those we can know in no other way. The ultimate goal will be reduction and a search for how much is enough. By analyzing the images as designs in a rectangle, breaking down the pictorial elements through simplification and abstraction, we will build drawings and paintings that stand on their own. Mediums will include graphite, collage, acrylic and/or oil paint.

Meetings will be held on Zoom and work will be shared on Padlet, an online platform.

WITH LUCY MacGILLIS



THIS WORKSHOP IS FULL

FIVE MEETINGS

Wednesdays

October 30

November 6

November 13

November 20

Skip November 27 (Thanksgiving week)

December 4

2024

11 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. eastern time

In this intensive ONLINE class, we will consider how Italian neorealist cinema was inspired by renaissance art. Parallel to our in-depth studies of 4 great films, we will transcribe from paintings that directly relate to these films. In transcription, we will draw and paint from the masterpieces, investigating, not copying, in order to grasp what made them so important and timeless. We will focus on The Bicycle Thief by De Sica 1948, Fellini's 1954 La Strada, Antonioni's La Notte, and Pasolini's Gospel According to Matthew from 1964. Each week a film will be introduced, discussed and we will sketch stills from each one. Participants’ painting transcriptions and sketches will be discussed in weekly group critiques, in order to address issues such as composition and the mixing of color. A packet containing prints of the paintings we'll be transcribing, as well as Fabriano oil painting and drawing paper, will be shipped to each participant before the start of the workshop.

WITH CATHERINE KEHOE

THIS WORKSHOP IS FULL



EIGHT MEETINGS

Wednesdays

January 15

January 22

January 29

February 5

February 12

February 19

February 26

March 5 (skip this week)

March 12

2025

11 a.m.-2:30 p.m. Eastern time

ONLINE WORKSHOP. For the first half of the workshop, portraits from art history will be the point of departure for study of pictorial structure, with a focus on the head. We will touch upon the universal proportions of the head; a simple, intuitive drawing method will be introduced to help with drawing accuracy. Mediums will include graphite, charcoal, collage, gouache, acrylic and/or oil paint or materials you have on hand. Each participant will choose and examine one or two images from art history and generate permutations through exercises that lead to simplification and abstraction. This rigorous and wide-ranging analysis of images from our painting ancestors will feed our own work and imaginations as we engage with images that speak to us still. In the second half of the workshop, you will take the experience from multiple exercises and turn your attention to the head in the mirror. The head we see every day is a meaningful, personal, and convenient subject for a painting. This segment takes a reductive approach to painting the head, seeking how little information is enough. Using paint, we will investigate whether translating the head into a few accurate shapes of color and value can create a truer likeness than a detailed description can. We will meet on Zoom and share work on the Padlet platform.

WITH CATHERINE KEHOE



THIS WORKSHOP IS FULL



(a second section has been added)

EIGHT MEETINGS

Wednesdays

April 2

April 9

April 16

April 23

April 30

May 7

May 14

May 21

2025

11 a.m.-2:30 p.m. Eastern time

ONLINE WORKSHOP. For the first half of the workshop, portraits from art history will be the point of departure for study of pictorial structure, with a focus on the head. We will touch upon the universal proportions of the head; a simple, intuitive drawing method will be introduced to help with drawing accuracy. Mediums will include graphite, charcoal, collage, gouache, acrylic and/or oil paint or materials you have on hand. Each participant will choose and examine one or two images from art history and generate permutations through exercises that lead to simplification and abstraction. This rigorous and wide-ranging analysis of images from our painting ancestors will feed our own work and imaginations as we engage with images that speak to us still. In the second half of the workshop, you will take the experience from multiple exercises and turn your attention to the head in the mirror. The head we see every day is a meaningful, personal, and convenient subject for a painting. This segment takes a reductive approach to painting the head, seeking how little information is enough. Using paint, we will investigate whether translating the head into a few accurate shapes of color and value can create a truer likeness than a detailed description can. We will meet on Zoom and share work on the Padlet platform.

WITH DAVID HORNUNG



THIS WORKSHOP IS FULL

June 12-16, 2025

Five days

Thursday - Monday

10 a.m. - 4 p.m.

IN PERSON AT BLACK POND. In this relaxed and supportive five-day workshop, we make small scale acrylic paintings that explore an improvisational approach to abstraction. The emphasis is on experimentation and workflow with special focus on the interplay between intention and chance in the creative process. We use various tools and both additive and subtractive processes to generate surprising visual events that can be developed into compelling abstract compositions. Studio work is complemented by slide shows and discussions that examine both historical and contemporary abstract painting. Painters at all levels of experience are welcome to participate. Workshop fee include lunches and some provided supplies. Please bring the other supplies on the materials list below.