Painting from Observation will be a team taught Schedule A and B marathon for 6 credits. Drawing, collage, printmaking and painting will introduce students to contemporary painting as practised by the RISD Painting Department. This course is a comprehensive introduction to painting. It is designed to develop confidence and experience with paint and painting. We will examine historical and contemporary trends and paint from life models and photo sources. Fundamental techniques for basic ground preparation, oil painting mediums and direct as well as in direct processes will be taught. Representational painting will be the primary focus but experiences in abstract painting will also be encouraged. We will learn abstract principles that organize composition, depict spatial illusion and describe form while developing a shared language for critiques. No prior painting experience is required.

Elective

This is a hands-on course, designed for advanced painting students who are fascinated by color, surface, transformation and alchemy, DIY processes, craftmanship, invention, and the stuff of paint. It is for those who are eager to dive deep into all sorts of materials, methods and techniques. The objective of the class is to arm students with the tools and resources to figure out how to make what they imagine and to expand their practice through material exploration and information sharing. With an emphasis on experimentation, play, research and development; advanced students explore, problem solve and implement specific grounds, paints, supports, mediums and tools into their own practices. The level of specialization and expertise students may eventually desire for their work could require seeking the advice of paint manufacturers, conservators, fabricators, other artists or even experts in other fields. How to identify and acquire knowledge outside of one's comfort zone, approaching and finding a common terminology with peers and specialists is also a part of this course. Relevant art historical and contemporary methodologies, techniques and materials will be presented. Environmental Health and Safety guidelines that apply to painting practice and painting studio safety will be an integral part of this course.

Estimated Cost of Materials: $150.00

Elective

Museums are stewards of history; the present moment is radically testing the role museums play as storytellers while also challenging how and for whom historical narratives are told. The colonial history of this region was profoundly shaped by an industry built on the systematic hunting and harvesting of whales, driving entire species to the brink of extinction. Located just 35 miles east of Providence, the New Bedford Whaling Museum tells this story and offers a challenging look into the great sacrifices made in order for American industry and culture to thrive. Through several visits to the New Bedford Whaling Museum this course asks students to reflect upon and interpret a wide range of interrelated subjects, objects, and their shared histories and relationships to both humans, whales, and the environment. From folk art to nautical culture, from colonial economies to subsistence hunting, and from natural history to curatorial practice, through research, students illuminate the stories the ocean has to tell us about ourselves so that our recognition of the past may help guide us towards a more sustainable future. With enhanced access to museum archives students address these topics with research-based projects employing a range of fine art media with specific attention to contextualizing within different modes of museum display. The New Bedford Whaling museum boasts a rich collection of unique and unusual artifacts, issuing a cautionary tale, and asking visitors to contemplate the tenuous line between the pursuit of profit and the destruction of that which is most sacred.

Elective

This first-year graduate seminar approaches painting as a technical skill, a historical practice and an intellectual project. Weekly sessions begin with group discussions of key readings about recent painting. Readings are organized in three sections. The first looks backward, to the problem of medium that preoccupied modernist painting and, residually, contemporary practices until the 1980s. The second section looks at the academy, the institution and the art market, and their effect on how painting is produced, disseminated, discussed and received. The third, the most speculative, looks laterally at a range of contemporary practices and their cultural frameworks from the 1990s to the present. Frequent studio visits will occur and drive some of the reading and discussion.

Elective

This studio-based course will provide the foundation necessary to understand basic color theory and practice in painting, art and design. A historical and cultural perspective will be introduced to inform ongoing color studies executed in the studio. Students will acquire the vocabulary to articulate color phenomena and the means to exploit the expressive potential of color in their work. Color studies will be principally created with gouache, and a variety of other materials and means will also be explored. Lectures, demonstrations, and museum visits will supplement studio work. (An in class presentation is required).

Elective

This studio-based course will provide the foundation necessary to understand basic color theory and practice in painting, art and design. A historical and cultural perspective will be introduced to inform ongoing color studies executed in the studio. Students will acquire the vocabulary to articulate color phenomena and the means to exploit the expressive potential of color in their work. Color studies will be principally created with gouache, and a variety of other materials and means will also be explored. lectures, demonstrations, and museum visits will supplement studio work. (An in class presentation is required).

Elective

This studio-based course will provide the foundation necessary to understand basic color theory and practice in painting, art and design. A historical and cultural perspective will be introduced to inform ongoing color studies executed in the studio. Students will acquire the vocabulary to articulate color phenomena and the means to exploit the expressive potential of color in their work. Color studies will be principally created with gouache, and a variety of other materials and means will also be explored. lectures, demonstrations, and museum visits will supplement studio work. (An in class presentation is required).

Elective

The work intensive studio course will involved students in an intense visual, aesthetic and theoretical discussion around the historical relationship of Cinema to Painting and Arts Culture in general and move on to the analyze the current embodiment of Cinema's more conflated and confounded, co-dependant relationship to the Art's of today, tapping into the cross-pollination resulting of imagery, politics and theory's as they apply. Each class meeting will involve studio work and discussion and culminate with a film screening. The film screenings will move forward from Cinema's very beginnings to a few of today's best Indie films. The concentration of the course will be assigned painting projects that will be direct responses to the films being screened and related critiques of these projects as they pertain to the films and the applicable supplemental literature, allowing the discussion around Cinema, cinematic and art critical theory and the Art culture to be transferred to the students individual works thus allowing for the work to be seen in a larger context.

Elective

An introduction to the basic language of the painting discipline. Emphasis on the plastic and formal considerations necessary for work that will become an increasingly personal statement.

Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Painting Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Painting

An introduction to the basic language of the painting discipline. Emphasis on the plastic and formal considerations necessary for work that will become an increasingly personal statement.

Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Painting Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Painting

An introduction to the basic language of the painting discipline. Emphasis on the plastic and formal considerations necessary for work that will become an increasingly personal statement.

Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Painting Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Painting

An introduction to the basic language of the painting discipline. Emphasis on the plastic and formal considerations necessary for work that will become an increasingly personal statement.

Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Painting Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Painting

An introduction to the basic language of the painting discipline. Emphasis on the plastic and formal considerations necessary for work that will become an increasingly personal statement.

Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Painting Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Painting

The purpose of this course is to continue development based on Painting I. Individual expression will be encouraged through a series of larger works which require greater time and organizational skill. Experimentation in different painting media, including oil, acrylic, watercolor and mixed media will be encouraged. Group and individual critiques are required. Outside work will be assigned.

Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Painting Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Painting

The purpose of this course is to continue development based on Painting I. Individual expression will be encouraged through a series of larger works which require greater time and organizational skill. Experimentation in different painting media, including oil, acrylic, watercolor and mixed media will be encouraged. Group and individual critiques are required. Outside work will be assigned.

Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Painting Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Painting

The purpose of this course is to continue development based on Painting I. Individual expression will be encouraged through a series of larger works which require greater time and organizational skill. Experimentation in different painting media, including oil, acrylic, watercolor and mixed media will be encouraged. Group and individual critiques are required. Outside work will be assigned.

Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Painting Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Painting

The purpose of this course is to continue development based on Painting I. Individual expression will be encouraged through a series of larger works which require greater time and organizational skill. Experimentation in different painting media, including oil, acrylic, watercolor and mixed media will be encouraged. Group and individual critiques are required. Outside work will be assigned.

Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Painting Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Painting

The purpose of this course is to continue development based on Painting I. Individual expression will be encouraged through a series of larger works which require greater time and organizational skill. Experimentation in different painting media, including oil, acrylic, watercolor and mixed media will be encouraged. Group and individual critiques are required. Outside work will be assigned.

Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Painting Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Painting

The purpose of this course is to continue development based on Painting I. Individual expression will be encouraged through a series of larger works which require greater time and organizational skill. Experimentation in different painting media, including oil, acrylic, watercolor and mixed media will be encouraged. Group and individual critiques are required. Outside work will be assigned.

Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Painting Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Painting

This class, required for painting majors in spring semester of sophomore year, describes five defining features of modernity, providing the broad historical backdrop for their invention: the individual, globalization, nature, industrialization, and abstraction. The first half of the class will be devoted to the visual art of varied geographic and cultural settings prior to and during the rise of these paradigms. The second half of the class slows to focus in greater detail on the high modernist manifestations of each of those themes (interiority, capital, environment, technology, and narrative), and uses them to contextualize the art and culture of the 20th century. Periods, places, and subjects will be introduced through secondary sources, providing a critical lens through which to connect the material to present day art, culture, politics, and experience (for instance, the rise of global trade will be seen through the lens of postcolonial theory). The material for the course ends at approximately 1989, setting the stage for a more in-depth look at contemporary art, culture, and criticism in their junior year course.

Enrollment is limited to Sophomore Painting Students.

Major Requirement | BFA Painting