Oh my, I had not realized it had been 3 months since I last put an entry in my Blog. September and October had been really busy for me as I had a ton of paintings to do for my Three person show I had at one of my galleries, then I had to prepare for the Scott Powers workshop I had set up at the Guild of Creative Art. I'll write about that workshop after I have done catching up on writing about the busy summer schedule I had.
I want to write something about my experience with Scott Christensen's 10 day intensive workshop I took last June. I have to say I really did learn a lot. The way he taught was really very organized , where he would begin with three full days of lectures , really breaking down the basic information needed to really understand what he has learned in his years of painting and serious study of the landscape and what it takes to paint it successfully. He then does a demo which takes a whole day due to the fact that he did a 40 by 48 inch piece! He takes the demo piece to an almost finished state, letting us know that in a couple of days he would show us how to rework it.
You can view the finished piece here
Then he put that piece away to be finished on a later date, and he did another painting that was bit smaller .
After that he let us out painting in designated spots where he divided the 40 person class into two groups, and meeting everyone at a certain time to work on each persons painting problems with everyone watching, which was very good because everyone got to see different problems and how he would fix them.
At the end of the workshop he did a group critique and again worked out problems on a collective basis. In terms of one on one time, although we were 40, it somehow did not feel that way.
I'd say overall it was really great . If there was only one workshop that you could take in a year, take this. If you really are serious about your work and really want to know how to get better at painting the landscape, Scott's workshop will give you the tools you will need.
During the last day of the workshop After all the critiquing was done, Scott and Kristie surprised me by wanting to purchase one of my paintings I had done during the workshop .
I still don't remember the exact words I was saying to them when they told me that , but I bet I acted like a babbling fool. So I think I did forget everything I learned because of that shocker. :) Now I don't think anything can top that workshop experience for me.
" Before Sunset" 11 x 14 , oil . Collection of the Artist Scott L. Christensen and Kristie Grigg
Before I end this I have to say that Charlie and Kristie really worked hard at taking care of the little things that really made a difference to one's workshop experience.
