In July of 2024, I had the pleasure of co-teaching the Summer Seminar for The Academy of Visionary Art, alongside Laurence Caruana and Stefan Lucas Allen. It was a big step forward for me, since this was my first time teaching adults. I started painting when I co-founded the Academy in 2013 and would never have guessed then that I’d actually be teaching one day. So, let me say thank you to my little group of Goddesses - Heather, Bobbi, Kyra, Jillian, Lily and Breanna - for trusting in me and in the process! It was a wonderful experience and I learned so much. I had my own idea of what I wanted to transmit, mainly, the layered approach to oil painting using oil whites and burnt umber for the underpainting, then glazing in oil colours. But it was also much more than that. Together, we worked on the subject of the Inner Goddess. I wanted for my participants to dive into their inner core, discover who they really were, and connect with their inner guide to bring their goddess to life on the canvas.
We started with an Inner Journey, allowing for the images to spontaneously rise up. Mostly I used my drum and voice to lead them on the vision journey. Participants had to relax and allow my voice and drum to guide them through the inner realms. The results were astonishing, sometimes bringing the participants to tears - unlocking long-held blockages or giving a strong, healing message to provide guidance in their lives. The next day, I offered a presentation on The Great Goddess in Art, History and Culture, which gave them fresh ideas and inspired new images while going through such archetypes as The Mother, The Virgin, The Triple Goddess, The Muse, The Lover & Seductress, The Priestess & Wise Woman, the Goddesses of Animals and the Earth, as well as the Goddesses found in contemporary Visionary Art.
We then started our paintings with a brown imprimatura and modelling the shapes in oil whites, which was a learning curve for some participants who were more used to acrylics and had the habit of working fast, correcting the shapes as they paint. My oil painting technique requires a minimum of planning and patience to correctly design the forms before glazing. Some really beautiful works started to take shape on the canvases - a Goddess from Ecuadorian Myth, a Snake Goddess, a Shadow Goddess transforming into light, Artemis under the Moon, the Triple Goddess Hecate as well as a Self-Portrait marking the artist’s new beginning in life.
Step by step, the participants were slowly developing their paintings - absorbing a new technique while processing the deep inner meaning behind their images. Some were complete beginners, and it was a beautiful experience for me to witness them picking up the brush for the first time (which happened to me eleven years ago in this same studio at Torri Superiore) and feeling the magic of mixing oils then applying them with a gentle touch of the brush. I’m beyond grateful for this experience, and the participants taught me how to teach by letting me know their needs, their hopes, their feelings and their ups and downs. I realised that our Seminar isn’t just about teaching technique - it’s about life, and going through that process together, supporting each other as a community.
During the seminar I started two paintings. As a demonstration piece, I created one painting of a Goddess inspired by a Mucha sculpture titled Spring. For my main work, I made an homage to Torri Superiore in the form of an angel protecting the eco-village while below a water dragon is spewing out the Bevera river. I will work on those pieces over the winter to finish them.
At the same time that I was leading my students through paintings on The Inner Goddess, Laurence Caruana was teaching his own version of the Mischtechnik to more advanced students, using warm and cold browns in the underpainting, then scumbling with white casein before glazing in oil colours. Stefan Lucas Allen taught the traditional egg tempera version of the Mischtechnick, inviting the whole group to render their dragon spirit-guides in the context of visionary landscape (which he painted using his plein-air method). I also offered an Inner Journey for Stefan’s class, which led to some very powerful, loving and protective dragons in their works.
Please find out more about our Seminar on The Academy of Visionary Art website
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