Painting in Time

This course is dedicated to getting our hands on the materials of oil painting. We begin with a series of studio assignments that build in technical difficulty as we develop a shared language for talking about and evaluating form; later, we continue this work as we move away from observation alone as a way into painting. Time, as a formal quality, condition, and subject, is our touchstone in these explorations. By looking together at a wide range of examples of painters working today, as well as through a series of more experimental and open-ended assignments, we explore both how time is embedded and shaped in painting through qualities like immediacy, duration, sequence, and trace, as well as the way that our works are themselves situated in, and act through, time. Studio assignments are the bread and butter of this course, with an emphasis on forming your own relationship with the materials and learning by doing. Topics introduced in each session are complemented by readings and slide talks that explore them further within the broad field of contemporary painting.