In this class, we’ll explore why artists have been drawn to the landscapes of New Mexico and consider the lines, forms and not forms where land meets sky and make visual poetry in watercolor. With playful and meditative exercises, we’ll allow water + color to lead the way and spend a beautiful morning discovering and expressing landscapes through meditative, intuitive visual storytelling. 

We’ll practice ways in which to view landscapes in new and imaginative ways while considering how we might express our own singular sense of place. We’ll translate our unique visions of land and sky through technique, and learn more about the ways simple watercolor mark-making and touch can transform water + color into form, line, texture, and composition. We’ll make mountain and cloud charts, experiment with heavy and light washes to see the ways in which to balance ideas of weight and atmosphere in watercolor.

While we play, we’ll talk about materials and choosing color palettes that are uniquely our own as well as traditional and non-traditional techniques (such as layering and texture) and setting up your own practice for working with watercolor and mixed media.

Some watercolor experience is helpful but not necessary. All materials provided.

Deborah Stein lives, paints and writes in NYC and the Embudo Valley in New Mexico. She teaches visual narrative workshops, runs twice a year artist residencies. Deborah studied the passing on of traditional arts with a toymaker family in Northern India, worked with NYC school kids as a museum educator at the Museum of Arts & Design and has traveled and taught alternative arts education workshops about seeing and translating the world in new ways for adults and children for a lifetime.

Saturday, July 22
10am- 1 pm
Class limit: 8

La Petite Ecole
717 Canyon Road Unit C
Santa Fe, NM 87501