Want to paint but don't know where to begin? This two-day structured workshop makes it painless and easy to ease into oil painting. Begin with a black-and-white painting (just like drawing) to become familiar with painting tools and materials. Be introduced to color with a simple earth-palette painting. Move on to a brighter prismatic palette, and then top off the weekend by completing a painting in a full palette of colors. This course will utilize still life subject matter. Drawing experience recommended.
 
Location: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Instructor: Frederic Kaplan
Cost: $225
Sponsor: Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
Website, email, 215-972-7632

Explore flowers and other natural forms, beginning with line and value drawing and progressing to full-color rendering in watercolor and mixed media.  Topics will include sighting techniques, line quality, tone and value, creation of depth, composition, texture, and basic color. All levels welcome. Tuition includes a $15 materials fee for floral subjects, provided.
 
Location: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Instructor: Linda Gist
Cost: $465
Sponsor: Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
Website, email, 215-972-7632

This 8-week course is for beginners who want to explore drawing and oil painting, and for more experienced artists who want to improve their artistic skills. Using still-life compositions, students will learn about form, space, design, value, and color through working observationally. In addition, the instructor will introduce a variety of artists who are representative of the lessons provided and conduct in-process and final critiques for a helpful synopsis of the student’s progress and ideas. The class will be broken up into two weeks of drawing and four weeks of painting, but the student is open to work in any medium if they prefer.
 
Location: Wayne, Pennsylvania
Instructor: Annie Thompson
Cost: $320
Sponsor: Wayne Art Center
Website, email, 610-688-3553

Acquaint or re-acquaint yourself with the pleasure of oil painting. Learn about the materials and techniques that form the basis of the medium. Students will use still life, simple and complex, as subject matter. All levels are welcome.
 
Location: Wayne, Pennsylvania
Instructor: Karen Fogarty
Cost: $380
Sponsor: Wayne Art Center
Website, email, 610-688-3553

Learn the fundamentals of painting with gouache, an opaque watercolor paint! Gouache is portable, fast-drying, and an easy-to-clean-up alternative to oils – great for travel or limited working time and space. Ideal for painters of all levels from beginning to experienced. Learn to develop paint application techniques for fluidity and control, with opaque and wash applications; gain the ability to mix color and to predict its effects; recognize and promote gouache’s characteristics and learn how to problem-solve with the material; learn to incorporate principles of line, value, color and space for a greater command of the medium. Work from still life to learn how to representationally depict a variety of subject matter and to recognize abstract concepts.
 
Location: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Instructor: Allison Syvertsen
Cost: $95
Sponsor: Cerulean Arts Gallery and Studio
Website, email, 267-514-8647

Explore the world of watercolor! Watercolor is a wonderful painting medium due to its vibrant and translucent nature, quick drying time, and easy set-up and clean-up. Learn the tools and techniques of the medium while painting directly from engaging still life arrangements. Direct and layered painting methods, color, brushes, and the variety of papers available will all be covered. Receive helpful feedback and critique along the way. Great watercolor painters of the past and present will be discussed including John Singer Sargent, Winslow Homer, Charles Burchfield and Andrew Wyeth. All levels welcome, from beginner to advanced and all forms of expression from realist to abstract.
 
Location: Philadelphia, PA, Pennsylvania
Instructor: Keith Leitner
Cost: $175
Sponsor: Cerulean Arts Gallery and Studio
Website, email, 267-514-8647

Explore both the versatility of watercolor and the exciting possibilities of color through still life painting. Learn to capture form with the freshness and fluidity of all prima techniques. Promote color in your work through instruction on color properties, mixing, and basic theory, as well as how to use hues in combination to create impactful compositions. Discussions and in-depth demonstrations will enforce all content so that students gain the facility and freedom to use color and painting techniques as means of personal expression. This course is excellent for beginners or anyone who loves color and loose, painterly techniques in watercolor.
 
Location: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Instructor: Keith Leitner
Cost: $295
Sponsor: Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
Website, email, 215-972-7632

The foundation of a good drawing or painting is "composition," or the arrangement of shapes, lines, textures and colors. Learn to create effective and pleasing compositions in this instructive and fun drawing workshop with artist, educator and Cerulean Collective member Alyce Grunt! Alyce will guide you through the process of making an adjustable viewfinder, then to practice seeing a still life arrangement as a collection of shapes that fit together like a puzzle. Learn to make “thumbnail” sketches – small, quick drawings – to determine the ‘must-haves’ and what you can leave behind in your composition. Take your favorite thumbnail sketches and make a drawing or two based on your most satisfying compositional arrangements.
 
Location: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Instructor: Alyce Grunt
Cost: $75
Sponsor: Cerulean Arts Gallery and Studio
Website, email, 267-514-8647

Color temperature is the perceived warmth and coolness of a color. It’s a vital tool for any artist for creating contrast and focus, establishing relationships between light and shadow, suggesting space or distance, and generating mood and meaning. This two-day course will investigate color temperature through a series of still-life exercises that will encourage experimentation, enforce understanding of color’s relative nature, and help you promote temperature effects in your work. Examples from historic and contemporary artists will be discussed. Instruction will be conducted chiefly in watercolor, but painters of all media are welcome!
 
Location: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Instructor: Keith Leitner
Cost: $195
Sponsor: Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts
Website, email, 215-972-7632

During this one-day intensive workshop, Beth shares her unique technique for painting with water mixable (soluble) oils. Known for blurring the line between watercolor and oil paintings, Beth Bathe's unparalleled style evokes feelings of nostalgia, like an old sepia-toned photograph. Beth uses unconventional tools including squeegees and Q-tips, along with her brushes focusing on composition, values, edges, and drawing rather than color. In the morning Beth will do a demo from a still life setup and show how she uses simple apps on her phone to simplify forms enhance value and emphasize composition. In the afternoon students will work from similar still life setups. This workshop is for all levels.
 
Location: Wayne, Pennsylvania
Instructor: Beth Bathe
Sponsor: Wayne Art Center
Website, email, 610-688-3553