Imagined Landscapes

Two-day Watercolor workshop with Master Artist Zan Barrage

My goal in this 2 day workshop is to open up a new world to you. A world that resides in your mind and your eyes and your ability to work in collaboration with watercolors to achieve breath-taking artwork that is uniquely yours. We will unleash your creative mind and set it free to build beauty and art without restraint. Welcome to your imagination. There are no limits here.

Art has always been associated closely with imagination. Painters, sculptors, dancers and writers have always been seen as people with vision capable of imagining things and bringing them to life. So where did imagination disappear to in painting? When did artists become expert copiers of pictures and scenes instead of being creators of beauty? It is time to unchain the creative force within you!

Please note: This workshop is not for beginners. Please make sure you have intermediate to advanced skills in watercolors before registering. We have so much to cover and we can’t include basic watercolor skills in these two days. We will have other workshops for beginners at another time. If you have any questions or you are unsure, please contact Zan Barrage for more details.

Details & Registration

In-Person Class

Ages: 18+

Dates: In-Person - Friday - November 18 to 25, 2022  Class Full

Time: 10:00am - 2:00pm

Sessions: 2

Price: $130

Materials: Additional Purchase Required - See the Materials List

Skill Level: Intermediate/Advanced

Registration is now closed.

What Students Will Learn

In this two day workshop, the only rules that will apply are the rules of nature.

Day 1:

We will begin by exploring in details:

• The fundamentals of landscape painting including design and composition
• Understand color character, how pigments work and their texture effects
• Timing, additives and mediums
• Working wet on wet, wet on dry, and dry on wet and how to make maximum dramatic use of these states of a painting
• Working with the laws of gravity and capillary forces
• Working WITH the watercolors. How to listen to your painting and work to maximize its lead

We will do many exercises to absorb and master these tools and skills.

The things we call happy accidents? We will learn how to make them deliberately when we want them.

Day 2:

• In the morning we will paint several small imagined landscapes using all the skills we built in day one. We will build a process of working with the medium and opening up our minds eyes to see what is possible. We will free our imagination to express our personal visions.
• In the afternoon we will paint one large work (1/4 sheet – full sheet, your choice) deploying all of our skills to create a large imagined landscape that will be a personal expression of your confident imagination blossoming and flourishing never to be locked up again.

About the Instructor

Zan Barrage

A classically trained artist, Zan is the recipient of several awards for plein air painting in Ontario. He is the founder and past president of Ontario Plein Air Society, a group of Ontario painters dedicated to painting the Canadian landscape from life.

I paint because I fall in love with a moment. Sometimes I capture it successfully, and other times, too many times, I fail. I am proud to say that my artwork has seeped into private collections from Australia through Europe to North America. I cherish all my collectors and value their choice to own my artwork. In a way, a work of art is not whole.

Materials

Due to present limitations in art retail, we will work with the material you already have as a practicing watercolor artist. The only things I insist on are Artist quality paints and 100% cotton paper. No exceptions on these please.