Discovering Your MUSEum: Transforming Your Findings into Your Art

What better place than a museum to search out your Muse? In this 6-week course, you can choose an artist or artists to inspire your own art.  We will spend one session exploring and sketching works in the Eskenazi Museum on the IU campus (estimated cost of parking $10).  Then, for the remainder of the coursework, you will create your own art inspired by artworks or artists that you have encountered. 

During our time together, you will learn how to understand what attracts you about certain art and how you can leverage that knowledge to enhance your own expressive skills. The course is a combination of active art-creation and discussion. By the end of the course, you will have completed at least one piece of artwork in your chosen medium. 

The class is designed for students and instructors to interact and learn from each other. In this immersive experience, instructors will coach participants in observing and communicating about art in ways that are both positive and informative. We will use a website to dispense materials and resources, including Museum information, readings, assignments, and demonstrations of art mediums and techniques. (If you need printed materials instead, we will provide them.) Throughout, instructors and peers guide each other through the process of creating their own personalized artwork.

You may work in any medium about which you already know the basics. This course focuses on finding your inspiration and translating it into your artistic medium of choice; it is not focused on basic techniques, nor is it designed to replicate existing artworks.  Instructors can help with techniques of drawing or water-based media. Because our journey involves sketching in the museum, we’ll suggest some simple sketching supplies in the first meeting.

The class schedule will include an additional meeting on Saturday, April 5 at the Eskenazi Museum, which will be discussed further during the first class meeting. For any questions about the class or trip details, please email art-carol-nancy@carolrhodes.net.

NOTE: This class is not eligible for fee remission for Ivy Tech employees due to limited capacity. Please see our CLL fee remission guidelines for more information.