Course
JULY COURSES
Our popular summer programme is the perfect immersion in atelier training. Students will focus on a different discipline each week, beginning with Foundation and progressing through Figure, Portrait, Landscape or Sculpture.
Artists can commit to the full four weeks, layering their knowledge and skills over the month; alternatively, they can select a single week or a combination of weeks to meet their needs and interests.
For some of our students, the July courses are an opportunity to consolidate their learning; for others, new to painting and drawing, it is the chance to learn the fundamentals and how to develop them; for those wishing to join us for the long term, it offers a snapshot of the school, the method and the community.
Book nowCourse overview
We always work from life, whether from the plaster cast, still life, portrait and figure model or landscape. We believe it is the best way to improve our drawing and painting skills, while allowing for our individual creativity.
Many of our students have used their artwork from the courses for portfolio building and to gain acceptance into the universities of their choice.
Course content
Week 1: Foundation Working with plaster casts and still-life’s, students learn the 4 key principles of representational art: proportion, line and volume, chiaroscuro and colour. Work starts in charcoal, gradually building to oil painting.
Week 2: Figure From a figure model, students learn proportion, gesture, values and paint application. Work begins with short exercises in charcoal to value and mass studies in grisailles, to longer studies with a limited palette.
Week 3: Portrait Students start with charcoal to understand the importance of shapes, mass and values in finding a likeness, then progress to painting using the “Zorn” palette. There is a mix of short exercises and sustained poses.
Week 4: Sculpture From a portrait model, students learn to handle clay and check planes and proportions using calipers and comparative measurements. The focus is on gesture, anatomy and scale.
Week 1 or 4: Landscape Painting outside, the course covers composition, value exercises, tree and sky studies before developing a large landscape oil sketch using a full-colour palette.
For further details in all these courses please refer to the detailed sections for each discipline.
Materials
A list of materials needed will be sent out before the start of each course, all available from Lavender Hill Colours.
