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October 27 - November 3, 2024
We invite you to join us in this relaxed, beautiful, historic place. Give yourself this time and space to joyfully become a better painter!
The setting of Salinara, with its rustic beauty, farm fresh meals, and interesting excursions provides the perfect environment for our “Spirit,Mind,Body” experience. Your artistic SPIRIT will be recognized, encouraged, and celebrated as you work with other creative participants. Your MIND will be engaged by discussions of Art within the group, and your problem solving skills will be challenged as you are improving your painting ability. Your BODY will be nourished with fresh food, walks, biking, and yoga sessions. The emphasis on this workshop is to help promote skill-building with your painting, regardless of your level.
Location: Marsala, Sicily, Italy
Instructor: Qiang Huang and Suzanne Enriquez Dougher
Cost: From 2000 $
Sponsor: Salinara - Art Farm | Retreat Centre
Website, email
May 28 - June 4, 2025
Join Alison for a week of joyful exploration of Place, in the beautiful city of Cortona in the heart of Tuscany. In ancient squares, by fountains or in cafes, Alison will show you simple ways to capture buildings and include figures in your sketches. Overlooking vineyards and far off hills, we’ll explore how to simplify the scene to focus on important elements and create depth. Drawing and painting on loose pages rather than in a
watercolour journal, allows us to loosen up and have fun with experimental techniques and a variety of media.
We’ll work with watercolour, pen, ink, marker, on different papers, to create images, which we will curate into your personal concertina art book of your Cortona experience.
Location: Cortona, Italy
Instructor: Alison Watt
Cost: From US$3,850.00 All-inclusive except airfare
Sponsor: Toscana Americana Workshops
Website, email, 978-407-7127
July 12-19, 2025
Join international artist and art educator Wendy Artin at Atelier Clos Mirabel in South West France for a week-long painting workshop. Enjoy painting instruction exploring the finer details of nature through wet washes and colour, light and form. All levels are welcome from complete beginners to professionals. We will spend 5 mornings painting the live model for 2 hours, with poses ranging from 30 seconds to 20 minutes. After personally picking a still life subject from the gardens of Atelier Clos Mirabel, we will paint preparatory sketches and work on longer paintings, experimenting with wet on wet, edge control, composition, shadows, and colour. There will be one free day mid-week for visiting the surrounding area or painting on one’s own.
Location: Pau, France
Instructor: Wendy Artin
Cost: 1595€ to 2695€ for accommodation + tuition fee & model fee
Sponsor: Atelier Clos Mirabel
Website, email, +33.6.79.59.04.91
August 2-9, 2025
Create your own original artwork and discover a wonderful area of France. To create a believable vision of magic one needs to learn the visual tricks of a magician. Lauren combines 19th century style fairy paintings with naturalistic/botanical watercolors in her own illustrated children’s books such as in her retelling of Thumbelina and her book Fairy Wings. Students will learn the nuts and bolts of book illustration beginning with the layout of a picture book, utilizing compositional tools including the golden ratio, color, value, atmospheric perspective and emotional compositions. We will explore creating believable characters and putting them into naturalistic scenes by understanding how to combine varied references and understanding simplified methods of perspective, anatomical proportions, and consistent light and shadow.
Location: Pau, France
Instructor: Lauren A. Mills
Cost: 1595€ to 2695€ for accommodation + $500 tuition fee
Sponsor: Atelier Clos Mirabel
Website, email, +33.6.79.59.04.91
October 4-11, 2025
Sicily – It's on everyone's bucket list, with colorful sunsets, olive groves, vineyards, and picturesque villages with narrow streets, a never ending range of restaurants and cafés, blue skies and beautiful nature, it’s a painters paradise… And it will be our home for 7 days. The workshop is hosted by the retreat center Salinara. Our daily watercolor routine will include daily demonstrations by Gary, along with time for individual instruction. Afternoons will vary between painting time, exploring the region on your own, or possible one of the many activities offered through Salinara – on designated days Gary will conduct group critique over cocktails before the evening meal. Limited single rooms for a supplement.
Location: Marsala, Sicily, Italy
Instructor: Gary Tucker
Cost: From $2300
Sponsor: Salinara - Art Farm | Retreat Centre
Website, email
November 1-8, 2025
This course will focus on using colour in figurative painting to create atmospheric and expressive paintings. You will work from a life model, participating in exercises based in colour theory. You will try out techniques such as painting on a coloured ground and making colour paintings from black and white drawings. This foundational work will sharpen your observational skills and deepen your technical understanding of colour. Beyond these technical elements, we will explore how to use colour to express something of our inner lives. We will take inspiration from art history by studying artists such as Gwen John, Lynette Yiadom-Boakye, Sargy Mann, Pierre Bonnard, and Milton Avery. Throughout the course, you will benefit from personalized feedback and group discussions.
Location: Pau, France
Instructor: Katy Papineau
Cost: 1595€ to 2695€ for accommodation + £350 tuition fee
Sponsor: Atelier Clos Mirabel
Website, email, +33.6.79.59.04.91
June 20-27, 2026
Join Celia Liberace for an immersive week focusing on portraiture and figure drawing. Create your own totally original artwork and discover a beautiful area of South West France. For the first half of the curriculum, we will focus on the portrait, weaving together classical and contemporary techniques to observe and represent form. The second half will focus on the figure, during which students will learn how to capture the gesture of a pose and build upon this impression while considering anatomical structures. Instruction involves the intersection between academic fundamentals – including perspective, light, shadow, volume, and geometry – and Celia’s own methods of loosening and guiding both the mind and hand.
Location: Pau, France
Instructor: Celia Liberace
Cost: 1595€ to 2895€ for accommodation + tuition fee
Sponsor: Atelier Clos Mirabel
Website, email, +33.6.79.59.04.91