Each instructor brings their specialized knowledge, personal style and creative gifts to students in their own classes, and to the entire group. It is a powerful jolt of creative energies, lovingly shared and multiplied throughout the week.
This year, the roster of classes and instructors included:
Digital Dreams: How Do I Get There From Here
(Digital Imaging) Carmen Hathaway
Creative Realism With Abstract Connection
(Mixed Media) Charles Crossley
Polymer Clay: Icons, Dolls, Puppets & Masks
(Polymer Clay and Textiles) Sarajane Helm
Creating Icons and Ancestral Memory
(Welding), Allen Uzikee Nelson
From the Spirit
(Acrylic Painting) Arlington Weithers;
Life Drawing
(Mixed Media Life Drawing) William “Bill” Henderson, Carl E. Moore
The Clarion Ledger ran a story by Sherry Lucas about the Art Colony, complete with color pictures and a banner on the front page as well as an online art gallery of ten images from the instructors. The images are now in the Gallery section here, along with others.
The sessions are intensive, and the week flies by in a torrential creative river of new techniques and talents, artistic and personal growth. For all that it is set in a hot and humid climate where walking slowly outdoors can help you to make it safely to the next building, the mental pace is fast and brilliantly active as the participants take the knowledge and exposure to the mediums presented and run with it! All of our work areas were air conditioned indoors, as was the building in which we saw short presentations each night by two of the instructors and on one evening by students. The work shown is always fascinating, beautifully done and provocative, and this year was no exception.
The dormitories are also quite cool and quiet, and bundled up sleep was very pleasant for those able to tear themselves away from the studios at night. By the time the moon came up at night , we were usually ready to stop but only because our eyes and brains and hands were exhausted from the workout! And bright and early, sunrise the next day would see us ready to go again.
Do you have a story to tell about experiences at Tougaloo Summer Art Colony? You can leave comments here to be added.
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Thanks Sarajane, for creating this wonderful opportunity to stay connected with all the incredible people I met in July at this years Tougaloo Art Colony.
Talent galore, gracious hospitality — what more could a body hope for? Another round, another year!