Painting Mediums

If links return empty search results, we may not have offerings in your desired category at the moment.
Please CONTACT US as we do our best to schedule offerings based on student requests.

Oil 

Oil paint is a rich traditional medium that is responsive and surprisingly easy to work with. Your ideas and observations will be the basis for dialogue with your teachers leading to your experimentation with color, texture, composition and form. You’ll learn materials, tools, and techniques as you proceed; RGS provides student-grade paints and brushes for you to use, or bring your own if you prefer. We offer beginning through advanced oil painting in Studio Class and in other classes and workshops.

Acrylic 

Acrylic paints are water-based, dry quickly, and can be used on almost any surface. Modern acrylics offer great colors and allow you to set up and clean up relatively quickly.  Your ideas and observations will be the basis for dialogue with your teachers leading to your experimentation with color, texture, composition, and form, and you’ll learn materials, tools, and techniques as you proceed. RGS provides student-grade paints and brushes for you use, or bring your own if you prefer. We offer Intro through more advanced acrylic painting in Studio Class and in workshops.

Watercolor/Gouache

Watercolor painting is known for its inherent delicacy and subtlety because it employs thin washes and transparent color, allowing the white of the painting surface to gleam through and contribute to luminosity. RGS teachers will help you explore what to paint and how to carefully observe, compose a painting, and how to work with tools and materials that will help you succeed.

Encaustic 

Explore painting with hot (melted) wax – the creative possibilities are endless! Encaustic is a versatile medium that allows the artist to build painterly compositions very quickly. Wax layers can be built up and carved into to create complex surfaces, making it the perfect medium for embedding collage elements. Those new to encaustics will learn the basics, from an introduction to the types of surfaces that are appropriate to paint on, to building the layers characteristic of the medium. More experienced students can explore fusing, preparing a smooth or textured surface, incising, mark making with oil sticks, embedding materials, image transfers and more.

Ink 

We offer introductory ink classes as well as workshops on drawing with ink and making your own inks. Ink may be applied by a brush, a pen, or with non-traditional tools. Drawing inks are water-based media made from various plant and mineral colorants. While traditional inks share certain properties with watercolors, they do not contain solid pigment particles. Inks can be composed of dyes and are of low viscosity, allowing them to flow smoothly from a pen.