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Polymorphic Media Exploration: Cyanotype, Paint, Wood

with Annalise Neil

Next session: September 5th to 8th, 2025

$500 More Info

Skill Level: Beginner to Advanced

Incorporating diverse materials and mediums, this workshop encourages play, curiosity and boundary-pushing. Students will create cyanotypes using photographic negatives and specimens found in Nature and be taught how to modify their natural blue tones. The class will work with various papers and fabric and learn different mounting and finishing techniques. The integration of water-based paints and collage will be explored, as well as sculptural considerations for wood panels that can support the work. Simple wood-working techniques using manual and rotary tools will be introduced. Come join us while we learn and work with this beautiful process in the fabled Catskill Mountains!

Annalise Neil lives and works in La Mesa, California. With a BFA in Printmaking from the College of Saint Rose, and a minor in Art History (summa cum laude), she has completed residencies at Playa Summer Lake in Oregon, with Mira Schor through the New York City Crit Club, and an artist residency in Motherhood. Her work has been exhibited nationally at galleries and museums including Field Projects, NYC, The Irvine Fine Arts Center, and The Oceanside Museum of Art. Neil’s work has been featured in publications such as ArtMaze Mag, Colossal, The On Being Project, Emergence Magazine, All She Makes, Resurgence, Ecologist Magazine, and New Visionary Magazine. Her work resides in public and private collections across the U.S., Europe, and Asia.

Course Fee: $400 + $60 Lab Fee + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

The Art of Tying Flies

with Judd Weisberg

Next session: June 21st, 2025

$200 More Info

Skill Level: Beginner To Advanced

In this introductory workshop, you'll learn the essential techniques for tying classic trout flies, from the alluring wet patterns that mimic aquatic insects to the vibrant streamers that tempt larger fish. Whether you're a seasoned angler or a curious beginner, this hands-on experience will equip you with the skills to create effective and beautiful lures. Under expert guidance, you'll master the art of tying the Black & Olive Woolly Bugger, a versatile wet fly; the Black-Nosed Dace, a classic dry fly that imitates a small minnow; the Hendrickson, a dry fly designed for mayfly hatches; and assorted nymphs, essential for imitating underwater prey.

Since childhood, fly fisherman Judd Weisberg has been casting lines on the Schoharie Creek and far off destinations such as Montana, Wyoming, and Japan. Each fall, a tradition born in 1966 beckons him back to the vibrant currents of Moosehead Lake. Judd’s creativity flows beyond the riverscape. As an artist, Judd works in various media, exploring the essence of Nature. He recently collaborated with noted pianist, Yi-heng Yang, who teaches at Julliard, creating the "Woven Currents" series. Their collaboration was Inspired by the Schoharie's junction pools.

Course Fee: $100 + $60 Lab Fee + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

Figure Sculpture: The Thinking Bust

with Arthur Gonzalez

Next session: July 25th to 29th, 2025

$600 More Info

Skill Level: Beginner To Advanced

Concentrating on life-size portrait busts, we will learn to sculpt facial and upper body expressions, depict advanced emotions, and create a narrative. The foundations of academic proportions will be used as a gateway to construct invented figures! Exploring impressionistic gesture and color theory we will underglaze our completed sculptures in the greenware state. Learning the “inside-out” building technique we will endeavor to manipulate the figure from both sides of the clay wall so the artist can express the influence of muscle and bone and skin. Come study with one of the country’s preeminent sculptors.

Arthur Gonzalez is an internationally recognized artist with over 60 solo shows in forty years, including nine in New York. Awards include the Virginia Groot Foundation and a four-time recipient of the National Endowment of the Arts Fellowship. Public collections include the Museum of Modern Ceramic Art in Gifu, Japan and the Smithsonian Archives of American Art. His many Artist-in-Residencies include The Tainan National University in Taiwan, The Archie Bray Foundation in Helena, Montana, and the Pilchuck Glass School in Seattle, Washington. Gonzalez is a Professor of Art at the California College of the Arts.

Course Fee: $500 + $60 Lab Fee + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

Watercolor Adventures

with Hilary Doyle

Next session: August 8th to 11th, 2025

$500 More Info

Skill Level: Beginner to Advanced

In this exciting workshop students will learn techniques in watercolor, drawing and collage as they draw inspiration from the beautiful Catskill Mountains landscape. Still life rendering within natural spaces (weather permitting) will be explored so that detailing is learned. There will lots of individual attention so that each artist can apply what they’ve learned to their own unique approach. Subjects include observation of the landscape, still life and figure. Subject matter and projects are flexible and open to each artist’s unique interests and needs. Techniques taught in class will include Plein Air Painting, Watercolor Collage, Wet-in-Wet methods, Masking, Texture making and Layering to create a range of painterly abstract and realistic effects in watercolor on paper. All abilities are welcome.

Hilary Doyle is an artist from Worcester, Massachusetts. Recent solo shows include “Probably a Goddess” at Dinner Gallery in New York City, and “On The Way to the Garden” at Taymour Grahne in London. She has exhibited at Mindy Solomon Gallery, Hesse Flatow, and Monya Rowe Gallery. Her most recent exhibition being a two-person show at Galerie LJ in Paris in 2024, Doyle has received press coverage in Two Coats of Paint, Hyperallergic, Bushwick Daily, and New American Paintings Blog. She has taught at Rhode Island School of Design, Brown University, and SUNY Purchase College. She co-founded NYC Crit Club. Doyle was recently co-director at Transmitter Gallery and curates shows independently. Doyle received a MFA from Rhode Island School of Design and BFA from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design. Currently, Doyle teaches at the College of the Holy Cross.

Course Fee: $400 + $60 Lab Fee + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

Painting Nature through the Eyes of Thomas Cole

with Elizabeth (Betsy) Jacks

Next session: August 1st to 3rd, 2025

$400 More Info

Skill Level: Beginner to Advanced

Renowned painter Thomas Cole was in awe of the beauty of the Catskill Mountains and created some of the most iconic landscape paintings in our country's history. In this workshop, our instructor, a Cole expert, will guide students through his images and methods as well as his journal entries, poems and essays. Students will then create paintings that stem from their own passions and responses. We will explore our magnificent mountain landscape, pause for Cole quotes and imagery, and capture the parts of nature that most excite, using both sketching and photography. Back at the studio we’ll create compositions on canvas using a method that Cole used: tracing. After a demonstration and exercise about color, we will begin painting onto the prepared canvas. Our goal will be to empower students to express the story and beauty that is inside them.

Elizabeth (Betsy) Jacks was the Director of the Thomas Cole National Historic Site in Catskill, New York, from 2003 to 2024, and previously worked at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Her paintings have been exhibited in New York City and in the Hudson Valley, and her written work has been published by both academic and commercial Presses. Betsy is featured regularly in documentary films and radio programs and recently hosted a 10-part series by NPR on Thomas Cole, the foremost landscape painter of the 19th-century and founder of the art movement known as the Hudson River School. Jacks has Degrees in both Studio Art and Art History from Duke University.

Course Fee: $300 + $60 Lab Fee + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

Spoon Carving: The Wooden Server

with Miles Gracey

Next session: June 20th to 21st, 2025

$290 More Info

Skill Level: Beginner to Advanced

In this introductory class, students will learn the exciting fundamentals of woodworking by making their own set of wooden utensils. Starting with an overview of the material, principles of grain, and examining spoon design and tool safety, we will explore the essentials of wood carving techniques. This is a lively course for those who are looking for an opportunity to start their woodworking journeys and makes for an idyllic place to start a dialogue between the trees of our glorious Catskills and you, the maker. Come join us in that important conversation!

Miles Gracey is a furniture/cabinet/object maker, working primarily in wood. His work explores storytelling, ornamentation, and narratives amongst objects— all predicated on touch. Miles received a BFA in sculpture from Otis College and an MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art. Gracey has been in residence at Houston Center for Contemporary Art, the Center for Furniture, and Haystack. His awards include Anderson Ranch, Berkshire Woodworkers Guild, and the Jackie Romine Scholarship at the Krevov School, among others. Miles has participated in numerous important group exhibitions.

Course Fee: $200 + $50 Lab Fee + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

At Scale: Coil-Built Ceramic Sculpture

with Ebitenyefa Baralaye

Next session: June 27th to July 1st, 2025

$600 More Info

Skill Level: Beginner To Advanced

Coil-building is a foundational ceramic hand-building process with principles used to make things that encompass pottery, sculpture, and even architecture. The techniques taught will lean heavily on understanding materiality (clay), the sensitivity of touch, and ideas of structure. In this workshop, students will engage all three of these elements; learning how to coil-build an array of forms, volumes, and structures as ceramic sculpture. In this amazing workshop, issues of intention, scale, and exploration of form will be shared.

Ebitenyefa Baralaye is a Detroit-based ceramicist, sculptor, designer, and educator. His work explores cultural, spiritual, and material translations of objects, text, bodies, and symbols interpreted through a diaspora lens and abstracted around the aesthetics of craft and design. He studied at Rhode Island School of Design and the Cranbrook Academy of Art. Baralaye has exhibited at David Klein Gallery, Friedman Benda Gallery, and the Korea Ceramic Foundation, among others. He is currently an Assistant Professor in the Stamps School of Art & Design at the University of Michigan.

Course Fee: $500 + $60 Lab Fee + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

Pouring Vessels with a Pinch of Soda: Mechanics & Inspiration

with Tyler Gulden

Next session: June 13th to 17th, 2025

$615 More Info

Some experience is useful

From the whimsical to the austere, pouring vessels have an outsized place in the pantheon of pottery forms. Using wheel throwing and handbuilding, this intensive workshop will include demonstrations and hands-on work to address creating spouts and handles for all varieties of pottery forms. Tyler will demonstrate sectional-throwing to increase scale, tips for creating new solutions to age-old questions of how to finish pieces with the additional complexity of appendages, and ways to prepare work for a high-temperature soda firing. Discussions about pottery design, craftsmanship, function, and inspiration will bring new ideas to the table. A soda firing is planned.

Tyler Gulden is a potter from mid-coast Maine. He received a BFA from Alfred University, a MFA from University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, and has been a studio potter for over 25 years. His pursuits in ceramics have included production pottery experience, residencies at Peters Valley Craft Center and Genessee Pottery, and positions as a studio technician at UMass Dartmouth and studio assistant to Chris Gustin. A passionate advocate for the crafts, Tyler has shared his knowledge and passion as a maker during twelve years as an administrator at Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts, through many workshops and teaching positions, as well as roles as a member artist and President of the Maine Crafts Association.

Course Fee: $500 + $75 Lab Fee + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

Big Burn: General Mayhem

with Bruce Dehnert and Steve Cook

Next session: September 12th to 16th, 2025

$760 More Info

Skill Level: Beginner - Advanced

If you love to fire and achieve heaps of different surface effects, or are short on atmospheric firing experience, this intensive workshop is for you. Come participate in a variety of firings and see how each approach can inform your ideas and work. Participants will fire soda, wood, gas reduction, raku, and the always colorful pit. Emphasis is placed on glaze/surface preparation and firing techniques. This popular workshop is an exciting, information and results driven experience with demonstrations, lectures, and hands-on participation. You bring the bisque-ware, and we will fuel your ideas with heat, atmosphere, and enjoyment.

Bruce Dehnert has a BA in Creative Writing from the University of Montana and MFA from Alfred University. He has taught at Hunter College and Parsons School of Art and Design, The School of Art [New Zealand], the Universiti Malaysia Sarawak, UMASS Dartmouth, and workshops in New Zealand, China, Japan, Canada, and India. His awards include three Fletcher Challenge International Ceramics Awards, a New Jersey Artist Fellowship, the Settlor Prize in Sculpture, and a Carnegie Premier Award for Works on Paper. His work is held in numerous collections including The Crocker Museum, the Yixing Museum of Ceramic Art, The New Dowse Museum, and The White House [Washington, DC]. Dehnert has written articles for journals including, Studio Potter, Ceramics Monthly, and Ceramics: Art and Perception and co-authored Simon Leach’s Pottery Handbook for Abrams. He is a member of the International Academy of Ceramics and is Head of Ceramics at Sugar Maples Center for Creative Arts.

Steve Cook pursues an aesthetic life’s “sweet spot” of beauty, experience, value and meaning from his current home in San Diego. Steve earned a BA in Sculpture (figure and installation) from Penn State, studying abroad in Taipei at Fu Ren University and National Taiwan University. He earned an MFA in Film (essayistic experimental documentary filmic installation) from CalArts. Steve has worked and taught in a wide variety of media and for surprisingly diverse industries in the US, Asia and Africa, for the past 40 years, earning both awards and condemnation.

Course Fee: $600 + $120 Lab Fee + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee

Waiting list available

Twining Baskets with Waxed Linen Thread

with Cael Chappell

Next session: August 8th to 11th, 2025

$490 More Info

Skill Level: Beginner to Advanced

Join us for a four-day basket weaving workshop with award winning weaver Cael Chappell! This hands-on experience will take you on a creative journey, where you'll learn the art of twined basketry using waxed linen thread. Each day will be filled with in-depth instruction to create unique, personalized baskets. Cael's expertise and passion will guide you through the process, from planning your project to completing beautiful baskets. Whether you're a beginner or a seasoned weaver, this workshop promises to be an enriching experience.

Cael Chappell has been working with basket weavers in Africa since 1991. In 2017 he started weaving his own baskets. Because of his deep understanding of basketry, he quickly developed his own unique style of whimsical weaving. His baskets exhibit personality and life which engages viewers. His work has been featured in many exhibitions and publications. Cael enjoys teaching and is writing a book on twining baskets with waxed linen thread. He has presented many lectures to weaving guilds and groups across the country.

Course Fee: $400 + $50 Lab Fee + $40 Non-Refundable Registration Fee