This hands-on workshop exploring photography without a camera focuses on cyanotypes and digital negatives. Participants will mix and apply photographic chemistry, coat watercolor paper, and expose images using natural and artificial light. The workshop will introduce historical and contemporary photographers working with alternative processes while encouraging personal expression through found objects and digital imagery. Participants will create unique prints while learning about cyanotype chemistry, contact printing with digital negatives, and sequencing images for a final composition.
A photo printer for digital negatives is recommended but not required; venues with printing capabilities may incorporate this step into the process. This workshop is ideal for those looking to expand their creative practice beyond traditional photography.
Materials & Supplies:
Provided: Cyanotype chemistry, uncoated watercolor paper, brushes, transparency film (if applicable).
Participants Bring: A digital camera or smartphone (if creating digital negatives), personal objects for compositions.
Class size: 10-15 participants
Available to: High school juniors, seniors, college students, and adults
Do you love a good mystery? For five decades, Agatha Christie’s primary obsession was murder, but her interest in houses was a close second, particularly the English country house. Taken together, some of her most popular works offer a keen look at the changing fortunes of English country houses in the 20th century. They offer insight into how life at the time was changing in these quintessentially British houses, both upstairs and downstairs. Join Agecroft Hall’s executive director, Anne Kenny-Urban, for an exploration of what Christie mysteries reveal about changes in the houses themselves and the people who lived and worked in them.
Viva La Vida is a musical journey through Mexican culture and history that celebrates the groundbreaking painter Frida Kahlo through the medium of the guitar. The journey begins with music of the Mexican baroque from a codex dating from 1732 by Santiago de Murcia that was discovered in 1942 in a Leon, Guanajuato, antique store. Next up is music from the early 20th century guitarist Otaviano Yañez. Yañez was quite a phenomenon celebrated in and around his native Veracruz through his combining of virtuoso guitar music with Mariachi idioms. Manuel Ponce, a contemporary of Kahlo’s, is the most prolific of all Mexican guitar composers. His long association with the great Spanish Guitarist Andrés Segovia yielded not just major works such as the “Sonata Classica” but also more intimate works rooted in traditional Mexican Folk Song such as “Tres Canciones Populares Mexicanas” and “Scherzino Mexicano”. Carlos Chávez was a student of Manuel Ponce and became one of the most important and influential figures in the development of Mexican classical music. Chavez was known for using indigenous folk melodies and rhythms in his compositions as exemplified by his “Three Pieces for Guitar”.
This talk considers Frida Kahlo’s work within the larger cultural and societal context of post-Revolution Mexico. Frida’s revolutionary politics and beliefs often informed her work, and more broadly her identity, and were part of a much larger movement related to modernism and “indigenismo” in Mexico after the Revolution. Frida’s work will be placed in conversation with works by other Mexican modernist, such as Diego Rivera, to elucidate how Kahlo used the vernacular of post-revolution Mexican modernism within her artworks.
Why did Ukiyo-e prints resonate so profoundly with artists such as James Whistler, Edouard Manet, Edgar Degas, Mary Cassatt, and Toulouse-Lautrec? How did images of Edo’s “floating world” inspire Impressionist and Post Impressionist artists to explore all aspects of European culture, including the Parisian demi-monde? This illustrated adventure will explore the connections between Japanese woodblock prints and the artistic transformations in Western art during the Belle Epoch.
A minimum of 8 participants, with a maximum of 15 participants, is required for each workshop with Salis Dembling. An adjustable standing easel and a drawing board must be supplied by the venue or have participants bring them.
This is an educational and inspirational lecture that highlights the powerful symbolism of the architecture of Virginia’s Belmead on James, relative to the history of this former plantation that ultimately transformed into two distinctive academic institutions for African Americans, by virtue of the munificence of the heiresses of the Drexel fortune. The fascinating synonymous relationship between the architectural endeavors of the early owners of the property and the individuals that eventually occupied it are highlighted in this captivating presentation – one that extends beyond unique artistic pursuits to exemplify the power and the beauty of the human spirit.
Learn how to use the settings of your camera as you also enjoy being out in nature. As a long-time instructor of mindful photography, Alexandria will take you through exercises of perception. A central part of the program is raising awareness of your own comfort in walking and photographing. Some of the assignments will be done individually and others will be done in pairs and even as a whole group. Topics such as negative space, freezing motion, depth-f-of-field, and color balance will be introduced.
For those who don’t have DSLR’s, cell phone cameras and film cameras are also welcome.
There will be a lecture offering helpful images of the history of nature photography. After each group of assignments, we’ll discuss and review work in slide presentations, learning principles of sequencing and editing along the way.
Limit: 15
A walking artist creates the experience of a walk and then materializes that experience in text, photography, film, or a design. The walk can be short or long, fast or extremely slow, in a pattern or in a straight line. The walk can be along an established path or through fields and woods without a path. The walk can be along city streets or out in nature or in a combination of the two.
This workshop will introduce you to walking art, its history and its practice. First, you’ll watch a presentation of videos about the walking artists Richard Long, Hamish Fulton, and Cardiff & Miller. Then we’ll head out to explore possible locations for our walking art piece. Together, we’ll decide on the design of our walk, taking the history of the area into consideration, as well as the sights and sounds. We’ll choose our methods of materializing our walk. We can film or photograph during our walk, or we can walk and then return to do the documentation.
The highpoint of the day will be doing the walk itself, claiming our path and our interaction with the land.
Finally, we can each write text or paint a design reflecting our walk. With Adobe Premiere, we can cut together a video that shows our walking art.
This program is for adults but can also be adapted to children and teens. Limit of students: 30
Document your watershed with art! Learn underwater filming with cameras we provide (your hands will be underwater, but not the rest of you). Take photographs and video above water of the wildlife and plants by your stream, pond, or river. We’ll combine the results in an editing workshop using Adobe Premiere. Number of students: up to 10. We have both an adult program and a program for children.