Holiday Quick Class: 85. Holiday Still-Life Boot Camp with Sharon Carol Demery | Athenaeum School of the Arts

Thursday–Friday, 10 AM–1 PM
December 5–6
[Students can leave materials overnight Dec. 5 and work in the studio from 1–4 PM (without instruction)]
(2 Days, 6 total hours of instruction)
La Jolla Studio
$100/120 + $20 materials fee paid to instructor

This fun and focused class emphasizes the basics of creating a painting. Emphasis in this class will be on an impressionist technique of painting using an “alla prima” (wet into wet) style of painting, keeping loose brushwork, thick paint, and eliminating detail. We will emphasize composition, color, form, and lighting. There will be a still life setup. I do a painting demonstration in each class.

Materials: Paints: Your preference of paints: oil, acrylic, watercolor, gouache … you name it! 

Please include Titanium White, Cadmium Yellow Light (cool yellow), Cadmium Yellow (warm yellow), Cadmium Red Light, Alizarin Crimson, Ultramarine Blue, Cerulean Blue, Viridian Green or Phthalo Green. Plus any colors of paint that you would like to use.

Brushes: Bring a variety of brushes for your choice of paints that include #2, #4, #6, #8. Good quality brushes make a difference.

Other materials: 12” x16” paper palette pad; odorless Turpenoid and linseed oil for oils; soft vine charcoal; 1.5- or 2-inch palette knife; paper towels; two small jars with lids; spray bottle for acrylic painters; sketchbook; color pencils; four canvas or canvas boards, 11” x 14” or your preference. Good quality watercolor paper for watercolor painters.

Suggested items:  Masterson Sta-Wet Palette Seal to keep paints moist; glass palette to go inside the box making paint easier to mix; Silicoil jar with spring in the bottom to clean brushes; two tall containers to hold clean and used brushes at your station in the studio.

Please email me at [email protected] if you have any questions. I am always available to help.

Max students: 13

Sharon Carol Demery moved from the Bay Area to Los Angeles, where she studied and began her career. There she developed her modern art with an affinity for vibrant color, purity, and simplicity depicting images of abstraction that retain their cohesiveness. She was associated with the 1970s Abstract Illusionism movement. Primarily considered to be an abstract painter, her artistic facility and mixed-genre style depict an artist capable of eluding classification working in both abstraction and representational painting. Sharon has shown in galleries and museums around the country, and her work is in many private and public collections. An award-winning artist, her work has been reviewed and written about in numerous publications like Art Magazine, the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and Images and Issues. Sharon taught painting at Arizona Western College in Yuma, as artist in residence, from 1979 to 1981, after which she moved to San Diego, where she attended UCSD and received the Professional Certificate in Art and the Creative Process. She attended Platt College and received a diploma in graphic design. She also studied human development at San Diego City College. Sharon has been teaching at the Athenaeum’s School of the Arts for 10 years. She has been influenced by her many travels on three continents and the great works of masters like Van Gogh, Cezanne, Matisse, Bonnard, Kandinsky, Grace Hartigan, Lee Krasner, Joan Mitchell, Thiebaud, and Diebenkorn. She says, “Painting for me is about discovery, growth, and human emotion. My goal is to continue studying the masters old and new to continue my journey in painting.”