Mark your calendars for April 2022! Full information here.

Join us at the Mediterranean Center for Art, Gardens, Plants and Design, Lafkos, Greece

Capture these wild orchid beauties by studying them in nearby fields and gardens, then working in the classroom. Through demonstration, lecture, and hands-on painting, make watercolor paintings from start to finish in the beautiful studio space at Lagou Raxi Hotel in Lafkos, Greece. The course includes a visit to the Pelion Orchid Center, time to wander the ancient kalderimia to the nearby village of Lafkos, all on the Pagasitic Gulf near the Agean Sea. Artists can work on watercolor paper or vellum.

Don’t miss a chance for this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to immerse yourself in some of the 50+ native orchids of Greece, and bring home at least one painting of your favorite. For a full course description go here. A post-workshop tour is offered to the ancient sites of Meteora and Delphi, led by renowned orchidist Phillip Cribb.

Artists have several opportunities this season to participate in online workshops with Carol Woodin. If you’d like to be notified about any of these courses when they become available, email cjwoodin29@gmail.com.

Painting the Red Flowers of Summer on Vellum

Denver Botanic Garden Zoom Workshop

Three days: June 22, 24, and 26, 2021

Vellum is the ideal surface for bringing the brilliant reds of summer to life. After a brief background about vellum, we’ll perfect the techniques of painting in watercolor on vellum through discussion, demonstration, and practice. Each artist will learn to build color, detail, and form through transparent layering, building up rich but fresh color, and creating believable form. Three days will allow us to make substantial progress in advancing or completing our paintings of red flowers by the end of the course.

Summer’s Beautiful Berries on Vellum

Phipps Garden Conservatory Zoom Workshop

July 16 and 18, 2021

Summer brings beautiful berries, and they make great paintings. After a brief discussion of vellum and its characteristics, artists will transfer their drawings of berry bunches to vellum. Through discussion, demonstration, and practice artists will learn effective drybrush techniques on vellum. Conveying berry shapes and surface color, as well as bloom if present, will be demonstrated and practiced. Each participant will have a substantially advanced or completed painting by the end of the second day. Botanical Art and Illustration Certificate elective.

From a previous workshop participant:

‘I have now taken a few virtual art classes. I think this was my favorite. The way that Carol ran the class made it feel like a real in-person class. But with the added benefit for being able to view the instructor’s demos very clearly.’

Zoom Workshop hosted by Coastal Maine Botanical Garden

Two days - April 27 and 29, 9:30 - 3:30

Explore the fascinating textures and patterns of magnified seeds or cross-sections of flowers or buds in this zoom workshop, painting seeds you’ve collected, sprouted seeds or acorns, or flower buds cut in half, in watercolor on vellum. After a brief discussion of the properties and types of vellum, we’ll lay out drawings of this rarely depicted aspect of plants and transfer them to vellum. Through a series of discussions and live demonstrations by the instructor, participants will learn to build up multiple layers of drybrush watercolor, gradually increasing color intensity, detail, and form. By the end of the workshop, artists will have completed small magnified seed paintings or floral cross-sections on vellum. 

 NOTES: Artists will need either a standard microscope or handheld digital microscope to magnify your subjects. Handheld digital microscopes can be used with their included stand, are under $100, and the image is viewed on a computer or digital notebook. If you are going to be painting enlarged floral dissections, or a sprouted acorn, then a microscope isn’t necessary - a 4 - 6X magnifier will probably be fine!

Examples: https://www.celestron.com/products/deluxe-handheld-digital-microscope-44302-c

or https://www.celestron.com/products/infiniview-lcd-digital-microscope

Collect a variety of seeds and look at them in advance under the microscope, so you know which ones you'd like to include in your painting on vellum. If you can sprout some of them these are also welcome subjects, including sprouting acorns or other nuts. If you can’t find any seeds, you can cut some daffodils or tulips in bud or flower and dissect the flower and ovary to show what’s going on inside. For these you would probably only need a magnifying glass.

New York Botanical Garden Zoom Workshop

April 19, 21, and 23.

On day one, Dick Rauh will walk you through putting different types of orchids under the microscope to focus on their fine details and learn about their special adaptations. Then, orchid artist Carol Woodin will show you techniques to achieve the waxy textures, subtle colors, and graceful forms of this flower family. Each student will make a book-plate sized painting in the style of a botanical monograph.

Phipps Conservatory, Pittsburgh, PA hosts live workshop through Zoom

This two-day immersion into painting in watercolor on vellum will show participants why artists love working with this beautiful but quirky material. With acorns, nuts, chestnuts, and autumn leaves each student can gather at home, artists will build layers, bringing life to browns and neutrals in the nuts and to vibrant colors of fall leaves. Learn to increase color intensity and build form, while developing techniques that take advantage of vellum’s best qualities. After the class is over, students can email photos of their completed paintings for a final critique.  Work in progress can also be emailed so the instructor can help guide students to the next stage. For more info click here.

Working will Friends of Wellesley College Botanical Garden, we’ve turned this class into a virtual class, with a combination of live online demonstrations and lectures, and one-on-one individual guidance and check-ins. The classes will take place on June 9, June 11, and June 16. Through instruction, demonstration, and practice, learn to build color through transparent layering, and see why artists love working on vellum. This technique will build fresh but rich color and create believable form as well as well-observed detail. A demonstration of stretching vellum over a panel will be given. For more information and to sign up, see Wellesley’s Spring/Summer flyer here.