RISD Continuing Education will offer two new workshops in June for students to discover and hone existing skills and challenge artistic boundaries. The three-day workshops, Experimental Embroidery and Encaustic: Taking Painting with Wax to the Next Level, scheduled for Saturday–Monday, June 8–10, are designed to be immersive, intensive and experimental. Both workshops offer small class size and include lunch as well as early-morning and evening access to the studio.

Experimental Embroidery

Instructors: Lu Heintz, Jim Drain
Saturday–Monday, June 8–10 | 10 am–4 pm
tuition $525 | lab fee $30

Fast becoming a viable art medium of choice for a new generation of artists, embroidery is no longer restricted to its traditional tea towel-and-pillow history. Join us for an intensive exploration of the power of thread with a focus on the experimental: You’ll be introduced to both traditional and contemporary hand and machine embroidery techniques combined with material studies and image making. Enjoy a small class size co-taught by members of WARP, a textile-based studio collective, and get early-morning and evening access to the studio. All materials, lunch and a visit to the RISD Museum exhibit Repair and Design Futures are included.

Lu Heintz’s transdisciplinary practice (textiles, metalsmithing, video, sound, installation, performance, paper works and writing) examines personal experiences on sociocultural scales. Her work has appeared in national and international museums and galleries, including the RISD Museum, the National Ornamental Metals Museum, R.K. Projects, Brood Film Fest and Strano Film Fest. She has received awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, New York State Council on the Arts, and the International Sculpture Center.

Jim Drain’s work has been featured in solo exhibitions including the University of Florida; Locust Projects, Miami; and the Blanton Museum of Art. He has participated in group exhibitions at MOCA, Los Angeles; The Fabric Workshop, Philadelphia; Serpentine Galleries, London; Depart Foundation, Rome; and the 7th Biennale d’Art Contemporain de Lyon. His work is in the permanent collections of the Whitney Museum of Art; Perez Art Museum, Miami; Museum of Modern Art, New York; and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. Drain was a member of Forcefield, a collective that merged music, performance film and installation, and which was part of the 2002 Whitney Biennial.

 

Encaustic: Taking Painting with Wax to the Next Level

Instructor: Dietlind Vander Schaaf
Saturday–Monday, June 8–10 | 10 am–4 pm
tuition $525 | lab fee $50

Re-engage and further your encaustic practice with a focus on developing and expanding visual vocabulary, building existing skills, and challenging yourself to work larger. Join us for this intensive workshop to hone skills including manipulating encaustic to create texture and developing translucency and depth between layers. Discover effective ways to handle edges and finishing work, plus best practices for packing, shipping and storing encaustic work. All materials, lunch and a visit to the RISD Museum to see the Fayum portraits are included. Prerequisite: Some encaustic experience.

Dietlind Vander Schaaf’s work has been described as the transformation of “disparate objects into elegantly simple compositions of pattern and grace” (Artscope). A core instructor for R&F Handmade Paints and the former president of New England Wax, she is the recipient of grants from the Maine Arts Commission and International Encaustic Artists, a Tending Space Artist Fellowship from the Hemera Foundation, and the Juror’s Award in association with the 10th International Encaustic Conference.

NOTE: Encaustic: Taking Painting with Wax to the Next Level is currently full. Add yourself to the waiting list (below); we’ll notify you if a space becomes available.