BEING WITH PIGMENTS SOLSTICE TO SOLSTICE SESSIONS ‘23 ~ ‘24
SOLD OUT as of December 11th. Please write to Tilke at info@wildpigmentproject.org to join the early notification list for the next course offering.
DATES: DECEMBER 19, 2023 to JUNE 18 2024
COURSE DESCRIPTION
This half-year online course with artist/Wild Pigment Project founding director Tilke Elkins is an in-depth dialogue with wild pigments as embodiments of place, knowledge, communication & communities. Balancing detailed, small-group discussions, readings and assignments with hands-on learning, the course is designed for dedicated artists at all levels of experience who seek specific guidance to integrate mineral, botanical and waste-stream derived pigments into regular creative practice, and to connect intimately with place through material.
Reciprocal foraging, land stewardship and cultural sensitivity, and making kin with interspecies communities will all be topics of conversation. Together, through demos and work-along sessions, we’ll engage sensorially with wild pigments in multiple mediums. We’ll process minerals into dry pigment and then paint, prepare botanical dyes and transform them into lake pigments and inks, and explore the rich potential of materials from the urban waste-stream. You’ll receive a small packet of pigments and other supplies from me in the mail, and augment these by foraging (with guidance) for your own materials between sessions.
In the collaborative spirit of Wild Pigment Project, we’ll be joined in March, during our explorations of inks and dyes, by textile artist and indigo researcher/collaborator Lucille Junkere. Lucille will discuss the the legacy of colonialism in African Caribbean textile history and the dispossession caused by the transatlantic slave trade, and look at the ways that these histories are held in indigo pigment. She’ll guide us through a pigment practice with dried indigo leaves.
Previous experience with pigments not required — artists of all kinds encouraged to attend.
***A note on course length: the course is spread out between solstices, at two-week intervals over a six-month period to allow time to complete assignments and readings ‘at the pace of learning.’
December (one week): Introductions
January: Land Histories & Reciprocal Foraging Practices
* acknowledging land histories & communities through action
* reciprocal foraging practices & guidelines
* safety guidelines for human health
* aligning creative practice with values
February: Mineral Pigments
* deep time: geological histories & mineral pigment identification
* working with minerals in all their forms: clay, sand, soil, & rock
* processing dry and wet mineral pigments with water and gravity
* pigment collaborations vs. “collections”
March: Botanical Inks & Dyes
: botanical dyes, hot and cold extraction
: indigo pigments & histories with guest lecturer Lucille Junkere
: all things ink: ink’s unique & unusual properties
: ink alchemy ~ water and alcohol-based inks
April: Lakes, Pinks & Wild Binders
: making dry pigments from plant dyes or “laking”
: beyond laking; ‘pinks’, and other alum-free alternatives to lakes
: plum gum, walnut oil & other wild binders
: egg-based binders — tempera & glair
May : Waste Stream Pigments
: intro to working with urban waste stream pigments: copper, iron and beyond
: reclaiming pigment-rich material from restaurant, construction and extraction industry waste
: waste stream sources of charcoal and chalk
: building your hyperlocal waste stream palette
June: Collaborating with Wild Pigments
* painting techniques for magnifying & deepening the wild pigment palette range
* wild-sourced gessoes and grounds
* painting supports: wood, canvas & beyond
* wild pigments & the global creative community: pigment artists & their work
* closing party!
LOGISTICS
TWICE-MONTHLY PRESENTATIONS: Beginning Friday, December 22nd, every other Friday through June 14th. Presentations will be a balance of live and pre-recorded, and will be available for viewing by noon Pacific time each Friday. Attendance at live presentations is optional.
SMALL-GROUP DISCUSSION: Once every two weeks for 90- 120 minutes — choose the group that best fits your schedule. Attendance required. Approx.12 participants/group. We’ll discuss weekly readings, look at suggested assignments, do shared mini activities, explore questions, and go into that month’s topic in greater detail. The small groups are an important opportunity ask questions relevant to your personal creative practice, to get to know each other, and to build pigment community. Discussion groups will not be recorded. Attendance is a crucial element of this course.
There are four options for small group meeting times. Group size is limited, and time slots are first come, first serve, so register early to get the time you’d like best. Please note: once registered, you will not be able to change groups, so please choose your group time with care.
The group sessions begin on December 19th & 20th, and are held every two weeks, with the final sessions on June 17th and 18th. (Example: if you choose ‘Tuesday Afternoon,’ your first session would be on Tuesday, December 19th, and you would meet every other following Tuesday.).
Tuesday Midday 11 to 1 Pacific Time / 2 to 4pm Eastern Time
Tuesday Afternoon 3 to 5 Pacific Time / 6 to 8pm Eastern Time
Wednesday Morning 9 to 11 Pacific Time / 12 to 2 Eastern Time
Wednesday Noon 12 to 2 Pacific Time / 3 to 5 Eastern Time
The course is offered at $888, on a sliding scale of $777 to $1111. Please pay what you can. Anything you pay above $888 will be applied to participants requesting scholarship funding.
A heads up: the course will appear in the shop at the highest price tier - the price can then be modified with discount codes when you check out.
To pay $777, enter discount code 777 at checkout.
To pay $888 enter discount code 888 at checkout
To pay $999 enter discount code 999 at checkout
To pay $1111, no discount code is needed.
A number of full scholarships are available for this course. Please submit the application no later than July 1st, 2023, to be considered. SCHOLARSHIP APPLICATION IS NOW CLOSED. Applicants will be contacted by July 15th. Priority will be given to people from underserved communities, as well as to educators actively involved in community-building through creative practice.
Refund policy: Apologies, but there are no refunds offered for this course.
Bios
Tilke Elkins is an artist, writer, and curator based on Kalapuya territory / Oregon, focused on site-specific/responsive painting and social practice art. Tilke has worked with mineral and botanical pigments since 2007, and is the founding director of Wild Pigment Project, a collaborative initiative she established in 2019 to promote ecological balance and regenerative economies through a passion for wild pigments, their places of origin, and their cultural histories. Her most recent work was exhibited at form & concept gallery in Santa Fe along with the Wild Pigment Project Group Exhibition, which she curated. She was a co-organizer for the inaugural Pigments Revealed International Symposium in 2021, and was a resident at the Sitka Center for Art & Ecology for the month of February, 2023.
Lucille Junkere (guest lecturer) is a visual artist, educator and researcher. Recent research focusses on the legacy of colonialism in African Caribbean textile history. The dispossession caused by the transatlantic slave trade means that ancestral and cultural connections have been severed. Through her work Lucille explore issues of identity and a past connected to chattel slavery. She uses the materiality of cloth, visual symbolism of patterns and embroidery, botanical and ochre pigments especially indigo to explore the past; loss, grief, healing, resistance and reconnection. In November 2020 she completed a Leverhulme Fellowship exploring Jamaica’s colonial indigo plantations. In April 2017 she completed a Churchill Fellowship to study indigo dyeing and pattern making amongst Yorùbá artisans in Nigeria, building on her work as Artist in Residence at the William Morris Gallery London. BEING WITH PIGMENTS EQUINOX SESSIONS ‘23 ~ ‘24