Gage Opdenbrouw – Critique Group (Online); Wednesdays, May 11-July 20, 2022 (every other week)

Isolation in the studio is a fact of life for most serious painters, and the solitude is often positive, but it can be hard to judge our own work with clear eyes.  A supportive and articulate environment to discuss your ongoing efforts with the brush is helpful, and in my opinion, critical.  In better times, I make a point to visit my friend’s studios regularly, to see what they are working on, how its going, what they’re satisfied with and what they’re not, and simply how they work.

 This group is intended to be a meeting for a critique group of dedicated painters who work in the studio regularly.  Participating artists will upload their work previous to the class session, and I will go over each work submitted, as if we were sitting in a classroom with all the paintings in front of us.  I will lead the discussion, but class participation and dialogue is strongly encouraged, and in fact, is the whole point.  I learned as much from my peers as from my teachers back in art school, and the same is even more true now.  There is the possibility for this class to continue beyond the initial offering as we get a group together where the conversation is strong.

Gage Opdenbrouw: 

“A deep thematic thread runs through all of my work, it’s a ‘vanitas’ sort of message, to take the time to be present, to notice the magic of noticing, the richness of what’s right in front of us. I think that there is something radical in making work that is intimate in scale and quiet in its content and its aims–it strikes me as a tonic, an antidote, for our times, which are increasingly dehumanized, and in which people are living lives that are increasingly disembodied, mediated by a screen, and constantly stimulated. My art is about connecting with this world, this moment, as it is, as deeply as possible.”