Facilitated by George Van Hook

Class Size:  limited to 14

Fee:  $300

To Register:

1. Email Lindamarymasten@gmail.com to express interest

2. Send a check payable to MacCenter (44 Gypsy Lane, Bennington, Vermont  05201)

Note: after May 8, deposit is non-refundable

 

Join George Van Hook, a nationally recognized artist has won numerous Plein Air competitions and awards from around the country for his oils and watercolors, for a two-day plein air workshop. George stresses allaprima painting and using a loose and fast approach to capture the landscape in the first try.

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Participants will be meeting on location and painting all day from 9am-4pm.  Workshop includes live demos and individual attention. Please bring your own plein air equipment, supports, and media (oil,pastel, watercolor, acrylic).

 

We will begin each day with a demo by the artist. At that time, he will discuss composition, laying out the palette, proper use of materials and all other aspects of plein air painting. We will then break up into groups and paint individually. He will then provide individual instruction helping solve the issues for each artist.

 

After lunch, he will do a quick demo to refresh the ideas presented at the start. Painters will start a second painting for the afternoon with additional individual instruction.

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After 4 pm we can simply paint as a group. George has found this to be the most congenial and beneficial experience of the day. Evenings can be spent enjoying one another’s company conversation about their experiences of the day.

 

Biography:

George Van Hook was born and raised in Abington, Pennsylvania, a northern suburb of Philadelphia. He began painting very early and was able to participate in the vibrant artistic culture of the region. His early 12-year tenure in northern coastal California afforded year round plein air painting. George has spent many summers painting coastal New England, especially mid-coast Maine and North Haven Island where his wife’s family owned property adjacent to the famous Boston artist Frank Benson.

Van Hook thinks of his paintings as primarily a visual response to the selected environment, be it landscape, figure or still life. “I want the color to be beautiful and the drawing firm and secure”, he says. The paintings are a marriage of external and internal forces – what emerges on the canvas should be a reflection of both the beauty of the world and the artist’s most inner response.

Van Hook, a nationally recognized artist has won numerous Plein Air competitions and awards from around the country for his oils and watercolors. George teaches Plein Air workshops around the country. Please visit his website at: georgevanhookfineartist.com

 

Workshop Materials List:

I always tell my students to bring everything and anything that they are comfortable with using. This is their workshop, and I will accommodate myself to their needs. HOWEVER, I WOULD LIKE TO SEE THE FOLLOWING SUPPLIES! 

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Oil and Watercolor Paints – Both. Suggest large tubes of professional quality paint:

• Ultramarine Blue

• Cobalt Blue

• Alizarin Crimson

• Cadmium Red LIGHT

• Cadmium Orange

• Viridian

• Cadmium Yellow MEDIUM

• Cadmium Yellos LIGHT

• Titanium White

   

Brushes:

A wide selection of bristle flats. # 2,4,6,8,10 should be sufficient.

For watercolor, a wide selection of sable brushes, both flat and round.

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Surfaces:

a large selection of panels in smaller sizes, to allow you to work quickly. 8x10; 9x12; 11x14

Several of each size, if you can get them. Watercolor: several sheets or blocks of 140lb cold pressed paper, of a good quality. 

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Paint medium:

thinner, lots of rags, etc. please bring what you normally use, and we will go from

there. 

 

Pastels can be used also.

 

Places to Stay in Bennington:

Knotty Pine, Hampton Inn, Best Western and Paradise Inn

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