Painting Instinctually (Online Course) Spring 2024 w/ Augustus Hoffman

May 14 to June 11 (Tuesdays), 11:00 AM to 1:30 PM, Eastern Time

**All sessions are live and will be recorded, students do not have to be present. All recordings will be available to students for 3 months after the final session, after 3 months the recording will be deleted.

DEMO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kOFv4qXpz0

Please check your email spam/junk folder for your Zoom invite.

Course Description

In this class we will learn to listen to the messy contradictory impulses in our head; the loud voices, the quiet voices, the voices that can’t yet speak, and we will start the slow and exciting process of organizing them into a coherent visual language. Our impulses, tastes, fears, and motivations are constantly changing when we paint. We deceive ourselves if we think they are static. Often it is our contradictory tendencies that make our work interesting. This course is designed to help you distinguish and cultivate these different voices and harness their competing powers.

In this course, we will focus on:

● Letting the painting lead us

● Embracing our “mistakes”

● Allowing our contradictory impulses to compete with each other

● Finding grace in the transitions

● Not being too dogmatic about any one approach

● Focusing on the importance of space and atmosphere in observational painting

● Organizing a cohesive palette

Students will be challenged to incorporate disruptive tactics such as:

● Painting with their non dominant hand

● Incorporating multiple vantage points in the same painting

● Working from imagination and memory in addition to working from life

The course will begin with a lecture which will cover the instructor’s own path in painting and cover influential paintings that have acted as guides along the way. Students will then work from their individual painting set ups, be it an interior, a still life, plein air, or even portraiture and will work on at least one painting (but possibly more than one) over the course of the class. Students will receive feedback from the instructor directly as well as fellow students. There will be weekly homework assignments which will require painting outside of class as well as one bigger project due at the end of the semester.

This course is designed for students who already have some painting experience.

Course Outline

Week 1: introductions, go over syllabus, go over slideshow of work and influences, demo, introduction to artist family tree.

Week 2: setting up a good spot to paint, listening to the environment, noticing the different painting selves that might show up.

Week 3: Organizing your palette: grouping colors according to warms and cools, keeping your colors separated by value, building up painting density

Week 4: dealing with failure, inviting disruptions, and finding structure.
Feedback one on one and in group

Week 5: Learning to be generous and learning to be ruthless, attempting unity, and going over students’ artist family trees.

Course Materials List

A Note on Materials: While the instructor will be working in Flashe and Acrylic for this course, students should work in whatever painting medium they are most comfortable with. If students have questions about any of the materials on this list please feel free to email the instructor at: gus.hoffman@gmail.com

Surface: Students are encouraged to work on whatever material they are most comfortable with. That said, the painting surfaces listed below are a good place to start:

-Primed panels
-Canvas
- Arches oil paper or a heavy duty water color paper
-Small notebook for sketching

Paints: Students are encouraged to buy a combination of Golden and Flashe paints. Flashe paint, a matte sign paint, works beautifully for darker pigments such as black, ultramarine, violet, and green. Not all art stores carry Flashe paint. Students might need to order Flashe paint online.

-Cad Red Medium
-Cad Yellow Medium
-Lemon Yellow
-Yellow Ochre
-Alizarin Crimson
-Violet
-Ultramarine Blue
-Cobalt
-Terre Verte
-Emerald Green
-Ivory Black
-White

-A series of different pre-mixed acrylic grays ranging from light to dark (optional)

-Retarder to slow the drying of paint (optional)

Brushes:

A combination of rounds, flats and filbert brushes. Please make sure to have several large brushes.

Palette:

Sta wet palette
Sponge
Mist bottle

Easel:

Stationary easel or a mobile one such as a French easel

Extras:

Clamps
Paper Towels
A straight edge you don’t mind getting paint on
Latex gloves
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