SPIRIT OF STRUCTURE: OLSON HOUSE

June 20 – 26, 2010
Maine Media Workshops, Rockport Maine
Register at www.theworkshops.com

Experience the rare opportunity of a week photographing the Olson House in Cushing, Maine. Utilizing inspiration from the works of Andrew Wyeth and other artists who have worked in this location, each participant will explore their own point of view through landscape, portrait, architecture, still life and abstract assignment. Returning day after day to this Maine icon will make it possible for your ideas to find expression in a collection of personal images. This shooting workshop is for all formats, digital or film.

The Olson House is classic vernacular architecture: an American farmhouse expanded and changed over its many years of being lived in. Between 1939-1968 its occupants, Christina and her brother Alvaro, as well as the house itself became the focus of a large body of work by Andrew Wyeth. His drawings and paintings capture what many of us to think of as the quintessential Maine. The house was donated to the Farnsworth Art Museum in 1991 and is now open for tours from Memorial Day through Columbus Day.

Since 1991, students from the Workshops have been allowed occasional visits to photograph within the house. Every class that I have taken here always asked for more time. This workshop will provide just that opportunity. Twice a day for the whole week we will have access to the interior of this structure in both morning and afternoon light. We will be able to photograph the exterior of the property during the time the building is open to the public.

The Olson House will be the subject and focus of the class assignments. This is your chance to use this location as the subject, as a studio and as the backdrop for an intensive week of work. Each participant will explore their own creativity through landscape, portrait, architecture, still life and abstract assignments. The assignments will serve as the jumping off spot for you to create photographs that best express your personal vision of and response to this location.

All formats, film and digital are welcome in this workshop. Overnight processing for black and white film up to 4 x 5 in size is available through The Workshops. There is no processing available for color film so I encourage you to work with an alternative for this class in order to look at your work while you are in the workshop. We will review the previous day’s work together as a class through projection of digitally made contact sheets. As this is a shooting workshop so we will not be spending any time printing our images.

Whether you have been photographing for years or are relatively new to the art form, this workshop that will challenge how you work, think and see. I hope you will join me for this unique opportunity to explore this extraordinary environment.

Registration

For further information and to register for this workshop contact registration@theworkshops.com.