Artist for a Day Workshops
Hands-on “Slow Art” Experiences in Florence for Adults
Adapted to all levels, absolute beginners welcome
Come to Florence to follow in the footsteps of Michelangelo and DaVinci for a day as you give
yourself time to enjoy a hands-on art making experience to connect in a personal way with the
rich history and beauty here. Each workshop is a self-contained lesson that can be enjoyed in
one day, or taken in a series for one week. Workshops build on each other to create a series of
basic skills that will expand your ability to see the world in a whole new way, and allow you to
touch history through the work of your own hands.
Your workshops will take place in the open classroom which is the city itself, and you will work
in museums, gardens, and churches to learn directly from the masters of the Italian Renaissance.
Each workshop takes place for 4 hours either in the morning 9:30-1:30p or in the afternoon
2:30-6:30p.
One-day experiences that can be taken individually or as a week-long series
Workshop 1: Draw with the Masters: Renaissance Secrets of Spatial Illusion- Prospettivo
Learn what Raphael, Botticelli, and Brunelleschi knew about how to make buildings and streets
appear on a flat page using the technique of perspective. We will go step-by-step to draw from
the beautiful architecture of Renaissance Florence. Visit & drawing in San Lorenzo church/
Piazza Santissima Annunziata.
You take home your own sketchbook with your drawing work and we provide all drawing
materials.
Workshop 2: Draw with the Masters: Renaissance Secrets of the Human FigureProporzioni - Proportions
Learn the techniques of Michelangelo and DaVinci to draw the body in a realistic way using
basic techniques learned through drawing world-renown sculptural masterpieces that inspire
your own original drawings. Visit & drawing in the Bargello Museum.
You take home your own sketchbook with your drawing work and we provide all drawing
materials.
Workshop 3: Draw with the Masters: Renaissance Secrets of the Human Figure- Volume Mass & Volume
Learn the techniques of masters in building up the form of the human body in a realistic way to
give a sense of volume and musculature, using basic techniques and drawing from world-renown
sculptural masterpieces that inspire your own original drawings. Drawing in the Loggia dei
Lanzi in Piazza Signoria.
You take home your own sketchbook with your drawing work and we provide all drawing
materials.
Workshop 4: Draw with the Masters: Renaissance Secrets of Chiaroscuro, Dark & Light
Learn the techniques that give shape and volume to human forms, architecture, and objects
through the development of dark and light tones. Drawing directly from paintings, you will learn
how to create and balance light to create a sense of depth and space. Visit and drawing in
Palazzo Pitti’s painting museum.
You take home a completed drawing and we provide all drawing materials.
Workshop 5: Painting Plein Aire: Outdoor Watercolor Workshop
Enjoy practicing the basics of color and shape with step-by step techniques to create a finished
work to take home or mail as a postcard. Painting in the outdoors in a small garden along the
Arno River in the heart of Florence.
Take home your finished painting ready-to-frame as a momento at the end of the day or be
mailed as a postcard to a friend or loved one at home.
Workshop 6: Giardini Incantati- Drawing as a Way of Experiencing
Drawing is a way of being, and teaches us a way of seeing. Artists throughout history have used
art to discover the world around and inside of them. Following in the tradition of Leonardo
DaVinci’s sketchbook, using just a pencil, a piece of charcoal, and an eraser, you will explore
Boboli, a magnificent Renaissance garden behind the largest palazzo in Florence, using a special
set of instructions designed to relax you, take away the fear or stress of making “good” art, and
instead open up your ability to perceive and appreciate the beauty around you in each moment,
and enjoy returning to the natural sense of wonder and discovery that is inborn in each of us and
with which we used to approach drawing as children. This is a perfect way to relax while
exploring both the garden and how slowing down effects our sense of well-being.
You take home your own sketchbook with your discoveries and we provide all drawing
materials.
Workshop 7: “Natura Morta”- Still Life Painting & Wine Tasting
Today we will enjoy using egg tempera (originally used in the medieval period as a mix of egg
yolk and powdered colored pigments) to paint objects we usually think of as food, in the Natura
Morta tradition as we enjoy a wine tasting experience to relax and open up our senses to the
subtle richness of flavors and colors in the world around us, learning to color mix and create
harmonious shapes through simple steps.
Workshop 8: “D’orare”- Goldleafing in the Florentine Tradition
Artisans in the Oltrarno (other side of the Arno River) have been carving, building, and then
guilding furniture, mirrors, religious objects, picture frames, and decorative domestic items like
candlesticks and lamp bases for centuries. We will take a stroll down Via Maggio and into a side
street right near Palazzo Belfiore where we will find a vast antique shop tucked away to charge
our imagination before heading back to the studio and learn how to gold leaf our own wooden
objects with a simplified gold leafing process.
Participants can choose to pre-order a picture frame, small wooden box, or small woodenframed mirror from our list a few days in advance of the workshop, or are free to bring their own
treasures to gold leaf.
You take home your gold-leaf and varnished object or objects and a handout with information for
where to purchase gold leafing materials in the historic center.
Workshop 9: Sgraffito - Scratching into Layers to create Beautiful Forms
We will enjoy a stroll along Via Maggio and Via Guicciardini to observe two Palazzos that use
the rare Renaissance Florentine tradition of drawing directly into the wet plaster of mansions
with decorative geometric shapes and human, botanical, or animal figures. After taking notes in
our sketchbooks, we will return to the studio to create a sgraffito-inspired image on a wooden
panel.
You take home a beautiful small wooden panel ready to hang with a cloth cord or ribbon.
Workshop 10: Mosaico- Mosaic tiles in the Medieval Tradition
Visiting the Baptistry and its magnificent mosaic ceiling, we will get our inspiration for our own
small mosaic creations made by adhering small colored tiles to a wooden panel and based on an
illustration or drawing that we bring to the workshop to use, or an image that we choose after
returning to the studio.
You take home a small wooden panel with your mosaic image ready to hang with an attractive
traditional metal picture hanger.
In addition, we offer three ways for Italian Travelers or families to add English Study to
their visit to Florence at Palazzo Belfiore.
1. Art Workshops in English: Our art workshops can be given in English for native Italian
speakers, with the possibility of translation into Italian when necessary, and handouts of key
vocabulary
2. English Individual Experiences: For two or three hours in the morning or afternoon, we can
provide expert English instruction to all levels from child or adult beginner to advanced
conversation using a hands-on and conversationally- based teaching approach which is visual,
interactive, and very creative and engaging.