mineral and plant pigments and gold leaf on reclaimed wood
to register, email 
Friday, November 4 to Sunday, November 6
This is THE workshop to take if you have ever wanted to make your own art supplies from scratch out of materials you gather yourself. Not only are mineral pigments free, non-toxic (for the most part) and an integral part of our local landscape, but paint you make yourself with these pigments has much more depth and luminosity than paints you can buy. This action-packed workshop will teach you how to make three kind of water-based paint, crayons and pastels, and introduce you to the intriguing world of color alchemy. Suggested donation, $65.00 to $119.00.
Optional field trip to gather supplies at a nearby state park on Friday afternoon at 3:30. Official group meeting afterwards at 6. Introduction to Mineral Pigments lecture giving a detailed explanation of the benefits of using mineral pigments and a brief but thorough history of their use . Opportunity to examine a wide range of mineral colors both in raw form and ground into pigment.
From rock to pigment: processing the raw minerals. We'll pound with hammers, grind with mortars and pestles, sift, and levigate (use water to separate out organic material). We'll also explore a process of further refinement called elutriation. Once we've prepared the ground pigment, we'll experiment with three different kinds of water-based paint mediums: egg tempera, gum arabic and rice flour.
Pastels and crayons. After experimenting with our mineral palette and trying out a range of whites, we'll use some of our ground pigment to make pastels and beeswax crayons. You'll leave the workshop with some pigment suitable for water-color (or oil paint, if you choose), plus crayons and pastels you've made yourself
Friday, November 18 to Sunday, November 20
Whether you're looking for inexpensive, non-toxic colors for yourself or to use with kids or chemically sensitive artists, or you're someone entranced by the abundance of local botanical color and want to work with it, this workshop will introduce you to the rich palette of usable plant color.
Color from plants is available all around us, from the colored foods we eat to the bright flowers and leaves we admire. But how much of it is actually usable as pigments for painting? Unlike most mineral colors, plant colors tend to be fugitive, fading gradually (or quickly) when exposed to light. Sketching is an ideal context in which to use relatively stable though not permanent plant pigments. Cards and invitations, face painting, party decorations and spontaneous art-making for kids are also situations which don't require that color last forever or even for very long. Book illuminations or watercolors that will be stored away from light are also wonderful contexts in which to use plant color. Plant colors are bright, often non-toxic (and sometimes edible!) and are easy to find and gather. Suggested donation, $65.00 to $119.00.
Optional a field trip to gather plant materials for paint-making at a nearby location.
Official group meeting afterwards at 6 for color-themed plant-based snacks and a lecture on the fascinating chemical nature and wild variations of plant color.
Sketching with plants. Exploration of a variety of ready-to-use plant colors appropriate for sketching as well as other ephemeral projects such as body painting, finger paint and food-coloring. In the afternoon we'll make ink from a variety of natural supplies including oak galls.
Making paint from dye. The process of making "lakes" will give you the skills necessary to make actual paint pigment that can be dried and powdered, out of a wide range of plant color with varying degrees of light-fastness. We'll explore a number of different water-based mediums for use with our plant pigments, and experiment to create a wide range of colors through mixing and color juxtaposition.
Friday, December 9 to Sunday, December 11
Most people love color but few really understand what it is and how to use it in a satisfying way. This workshop guides participants to make colors sing together through honing a deeply personal experience of color. Color is about relationships. To try to understand color by looking at individual colors separately is as useful as trying to listen to music as isolated, single notes. As with music, color preference is unique to every individual, and each person's experience of color springs from awareness and refinement of their own color tastes. It is impossible to truly get color if one does not develop one's own sense of which colors sing together and which do not.
In the process of refining your personal color vocabulary, you'll learn about what color is physically Ð how it manifests in different forms on the planet. Did you know, for example, that blue eyes are not really blue? You'll play with how colors interact with each other and witness the magic of transforming colors simply by changing their placement, proportion, and the backgrounds they sit on. These teachings will help you resolve questions you have about color relationships. Access to the Tilkin School Color Library will give you the opportunity to explore color in a variety of different textural contexts. You'll come away with tools to make colors truly shine together in any circumstance. Whether you're an artist, a designer, a teacher, or simply someone who wants to become more attuned to the beauty and importance of color, this workshop will transform your color vision. Suggested donation, $65.00 to $119.00.
Color-themed refreshments, lecture with visual aids about personal color preference and experiencing color. Participants are encouraged to bring an image or an object that reflects their color preference.
Color questionnaires and a brief discussion about color preference. Lecture with hands-on visual aids about the different manifestation of color on the planet will follow. Next, a series of experiences which require selecting colors from the in-classroom Color Library in different forms -- cloth, paper and colored objects -- will prompt participants to an increased awareness of their preferred colors. Once these personal palettes have been loosely established, we'll begin to play with what can be done to make the colors sing together, and what happens when they do not. We'll finish the day with an engaging group color game.
Color relationship and its subtleties. The art of "subtraction," or how-to-mix-colors-without-using-any paint is brilliantly illustrated by paper-cutting exercises developed by Bauhaus artist Joseph Albers. We'll explore these properties in detail. Then we'll go step by step through a dynamic teaching about color designed to bring out "inner light," the divine quality inherent in colors that harmonize together. We'll use this new knowledge to further refine our personal palette collections, which will be photographed at several stages along to way to record their evolution. We'll end the day with a color celebration potluck and other color festivities.
Color is no more separable from its context than music is from the objects which produce it. The Tilkin School Color Library is an evolving collection of colored objects with a variety of textures and sizes, which provide students and library members the opportunity to experiment with color as it manifests in daily experience.
Donations of natural fibers, children's blocks and other wooden objects, and natural objects with distinctive coloration are always welcome.
to register, email